Mirror
by Bandit-sama
Summary: Dante bites off more then he can chew when he’s thrown into a demon-human contract for his life with a mourning pregnant woman. But when a group of mysterious demons pop up, Dante finds himself twisted in a tale Sparda and Eva started years ago. AU, OC
1. Induced Missing

Disclaimer for all chapters: I don't own Devil May Cry or any of its characters. I only own Hezen and Pena and any other OCs that come in.

An extra thank you out to **Maiafay** for helping with this chapter. Please, if you get the chance check out **Maiafay's **works.

This is what happens when you leave me alone with DMC 3. Speaking of which, this story takes place a year **before** Devil May Cry 3. I hope this goes well, I really don't know where this is going to go, meaning I don't know the ending.

This is not a Dante/OC story. The OC in this story will not fall for Dante or the other way around. You'll have to see the relationship that blooms from this very strange circumstance.

Enjoy!

* * *

Demons surrounded Dante on all sides. A drunken and excited grin crossed his face as he swirled Ebony and Ivory on his index fingers to show the surrounding beasts his confidence. A nearby hooded demon raised up its sharp scythe with a roar from the pit of its gut, sending a warning to Dante.

He loved this being out on a mission, earning money at what he did best. He loved the adrenaline rush, and the way the gunpowder smelled when he fired shot after shot. Nothing fit Dante more then going out on missions and killing demons over and over again but the problem _this_ time around was that a large amount of alcohol was running through him. The pumping of his heart from the fight forced the alcohol and adrenaline through his body quicker then usual.

Dante stood in the middle of the city's local park where children often held football games because of the large stretch of grass. He had been walking home from the bar and decided to take the shortcut through the park so he could avoid the police. He didn't want to end up in jail _again_ for public intoxication, that adventure cost him that month's rent and he couldn't afford it again.

"Come on!" Dante yelled. "Put up more of a fight!"

Dante refused to give the demons any more then his bullets, these low ranking demons didn't deserve to be torn apart by his sword. So as a substitute, Dante began firing hundred of bullets in their direction.

Dante swirled around in a circle, firing at the demons as they raised their scythes towards him. A demon jumped out from behind the crowd with its scythe high in the air. It released a scream that gave away its position in the air to the distracted devil hunter.

"So you wanna fight 'eh?" he asked the demon as his vision doubled for a moment. "Dammit."

The demon slammed its scythe down onto Dante, aiming for the crook of the white haired man's neck. Dante growled and moved his right arm in order to defend himself. The scythe penetrated Dante's arm.

"Son of a bitch," Dante groaned.

Pain shot through Dante's arm and ran down his spine. He had grown accustom to this kind of pain, but it still burned for a moment as if it were new. Dante bit down on his inner cheek for a few seconds until the burning in his arm dissipated.

"Now," Dante moved Ivory against the demon's face, "you're dead."

Bullets shot out from Ivory's barrel with such force that the demon flew up into the sky. Dante watched the demon begin to fall from the sky, and before it hit the ground, the demon transformed into dust that scattered all around the grassy area near the fifty yard line.

"That's right," Dante said, spit flying from his mouth. "Die. Now for the rest of ya!"

Dante ripped the scythe that stuck out from his arm and flung it out towards the remaining group of five demons. The scythe hit one of the smaller demons, entered through its stomach and out through its back, and pushed it back until it slammed against a nearby tree where the scythe stuck it to the trunk.

Now a demon short, Dante began shooting at the rest as the grin on his face faded for a moment. These types of demons had been there that day, the day his mother had been killed and his brother, Vergil, disappeared. Why couldn't he have been this strong back then? The skills he used every day could have killed those demons, why couldn't he have gained power like this before? These demons were _nothing_ now…so why had they been so powerful back then?

The acid in his stomach began to gurgle. The adrenaline running through his body pumped harder as the alcohol began to tap into his hidden emotions. His finger trigger pulled a bit harder against the trigger, and harder, and harder until Dante found himself in a rage.

The last demon fell to the ground without a hassle. Dante lowered his guns while the rage flipped his stomach over and tied it into a knot. Screw these Goddamned demons! He stepped over to a pile of sand, stomped on it, and rubbed the toe of his boot into it. These bastards weren't worth getting upset over.

_Screw it._ Dante turned around and began walking away when the sound of a demon yell caught his attention. He swirled around and spotted the demon against the tree wiggling in agony.

It wasn't worth getting upset over.

Dante fired one shot towards the demon. The bullet ripped through the demon's head, killing it before the demon could even _feel_ the shot.

"Bastard," he whispered.

He placed his guns back into his holsters on his back, and left the park. He entered the main part of the city; a busy intersection during the day but an empty lonely street during the night. Dante stood near a stoplight, waited for it to change, laughed, and crossed the street without looking. Soon, he found a small brick alleyway that would make a good shortcut to his shop.

_Finally._ Dante walked down the alleyway when a sudden buzz came over him. He leaned against the alleyway as the world spun around him to calm down.

"Stupid demons," he snorted with a grin. "Hell I could go another round if you'd put up more of a fight!"

He laughed, it echoing through the dark alleyway littered with paper, cans, empty beer bottles and tipped over garbage cans. The world stopped spinning for a moment, allowing Dante to look up and see a chain metal fence in front of him.

"This is stupid," he mumbled to himself. "So stupid."

The brick alley around Dante began to swirl around him once more. He felt himself trip over knocked over garbage can but he quickly caught himself and regained his teetering balance. He kicked whatever he had tripped over and heard and glass break a few feet away from him.

"Dammit! Piece of shit."

The alcohol inside of him made the world to flip upside down but it felt so good. He was away from everything that bothered him, and in a different world where he wouldn't have to worry about demons, money, or the memories that plagued him. He was safe here. The image of his mother's dead body would not haunt him during this time…not yet.

_I need something to eat_. Dante shook his head. _Must be…late._ He gave a sarcastic laugh. _It's three in the morning duh! Now…what's open at three in the morning?_

Dante stumbled but caught himself, and kept walking down the street as if it never happened. He was trying to think of some place that would be open this late but nothing came to mind but donut shops and Seven Eleven's. The next time he bothered to look up he found himself standing in the middle of the park again.

_Damn I must have been walking pretty fast. I wasn't even thinkin' about where I was going!_ He looked around and leaned against a large statue. Ignoring the golden colored plate sitting on the front of the gray statue, he fell against the plate and looked for a footing for his hand.

_Can't even stand up. Dammit, I'm never drinking against what's his face again._ Dante shook his head. _Shit. Could it get any worse?_

Thunder clapped above him, and rain began to fall slowly and then became harder. Dante twitched, what a time to be out and shit faced.

_Shouldn't have said anything._ He moved his head back and looked up towards the rain.

So cold. He felt the water hit his face and then trickle down his neck. His hair began to stick to his head and to his face, and the cold air around him made small puffs of white air escape his mouth. The noise of the rain rang through his ears, and the smell of the grass floated up his nose and triggered hundreds of memories a drunken mind didn't need. Nights like this, when the sky threw down millions of drops of water, Dante would cling to _her_.

"Mother," he whispered.

The lightening above him came once more only this time it looked as if the light covered the entire sky. Dante could see that the sky above him spinning just as the alleyway had, the gray clouds mixing together in some sort of childish painting. He closed his eyes, only to find that the darkness behind his eyelids spun around as well.

_Just until it stops spinning._ He told himself. _Just until then._

Dante sighed and closed his eyes. Suddenly, they became heavy, and he couldn't open them anymore. He tried but his eyes refused to reopen and stare and the marry-go-round that never seemed to stop. But instead of trying time after failing so many times, he found it relaxing and kept them closed.

xXx

Darkness.

Dante couldn't see anything other then darkness. The whirling sensation had dissipated, but the darkness he had seen hadn't left him yet. Was he dead? He pushed himself to open his eyes once more but even when he thought they were open, all there was to see was darkness. There wasn't any noise around him, no more rain or thunder.

Then came a light, a bright, white light that tore through his dark surroundings.

"_Dante, wake up_."

_Mother?_

"_Just wake up…Dante_."

"Mother!" Dante sat up, panting.

His light blue eyes searched the area around him but instead of seeing the natural park he had fallen asleep in, he found himself in some sort of large bedroom. The grass underneath him was now a hefty queen sized bed lined with white sheets and light blue pillows that matched the color of bright sunny day. Next to the bed stood a nightstand with a lamp, a bright yellow clock, and a glass of water and behind the nightstand stood a wall of nothing but windows that touched both ceiling and floor. Dante leaned forward a bit and stared out of the windows until he spotted tiny drips falling from the sky. Pulling away from the windows with his question answered, he looked in front of him and saw a brown dresser with small knickknacks covering the top of it.

The room spun once more, but this time he wasn't drunk.

"Where the hell?" Dante moved his right hand to his face only to feel that he had a high fever.

"Meow!!"

Dante narrowed his eyes in the direction the sound had come from and found a thin pitch black cat at the end of the bed. It stretched its front paws forward, then its back as a small yellow bell jingled.

"Do you know where I am?" he asked with a frown.

The cat just looked away from Dante, hopped off of the bed, and walked over to the front door. It looked back at him, then back towards the door where it raised its right front paw and scratched at the door.

"You want out?"

Dante moved his legs over the side of the bed and a breeze of hot air hit him on his naked legs. Moving his head down, he saw that every article of his clothing but his boxers had been taken off. Ew, what kind of place had he landed in now? Twitching, the white haired boy ran his fingers through his hair and hopped off the bed. He placed his legs onto the ground, but when his left leg hit the ground it faltered and he wobbled to the right side a bit.

_Damn._ A pain shot up from his left leg that felt similar to the pain he had felt in his arm the night before. _I must have done something to it in that fight._

He began walking once more, only now with a limp. Damn what had those stupid, useless demons done to him? Forgetting his musings, Dante grabbed the door handle and pulled open the door with a loud _creak_ noise. He flinched at the noise as the cat beneath him ran out, and he limped into a hallway.

The hallway the door connected to reminded him of the night before; no light came to aid him through the dark hallway but as he neared the end of the hallway he found the main room. A kitchenette took place on his right with a small dining room in front of a bar that latched onto the edge of the kitchen. The living room was to his left, complete with a comfy looking black leather couch and a bookshelf beside it. Thick towels covered the entire far left side of the room and gave Dante a dark and gloomy feeling as if someone were trying to keep something out. But what caught his attention the most was the young woman sitting in front of a computer that had been placed on the wall right in front of him.

Good a _woman_ had saved him. At least it wasn't some strange man with a weird fetish like that one time…

_She must be the one that brought me here._ Dante thought. He began moving into the living room to speak with the woman there when his bare foot caught on something on the floor. Looking down, he found a pink blanket thrown on the floor along with a number of pillows and a few other blankets. _She must have slept on the couch. How long have I been out?_ Dante shook his head.

Taking in a deep breath, Dante limped over towards the woman, and grabbed her shoulder. The woman jumped in surprise, and turned around while ripping the headphones from her ears. "Shit on a shingle!!" she hissed. "You scared the shit out of me!"

Dante blinked, he hadn't been expecting her to react like _that_. "Where am I?" he asked as she looked at him with dark brown eyes hidden behind a thin pair of black edged glasses..

"Back at my place," she answered with a sigh. She pushed one of her blank bangs back behind her ear while the other cupped her face. "It seems like you've caught a cold and you popped your left knee out of place. I put it back two nights ago, I'm amazed that you can even _stand_ on that leg."

He rolled his eyes. "What are you, a doctor?"

Her eyes slanted as a small smile tugged on the corner of her lips. "Doctor Hezen Major at your service. I work at the hospital downtown and found you on my way home from work."

Really? She really was a doctor? Dante opened his mouth to say something back when his vision suddenly doubled. He shook his head, trying to rid himself of the heat radiating from his forehead. "Where's all my stuff?"

Hezen pointed into the dinning room, her black long sleeved shirt moving with her arm. "Your guns and sword are over there. Most of your clothes are in the wash _again_ and your coat is at a dry cleaners getting patched up."

"When can I leave?"

"When your fever breaks." Hezen pointed to the couch. "Go lay down. The sooner this is over with the sooner you can leave."

True, if he ran into more demons while he was out without his usual equipment and a high abnormal fever, he would be in more trouble. He didn't _want_ to stay but if someone was going to offer him a warm bed or couch for free, hell why shouldn't he take it?

Figuring there was no point in arguing with her, his fever prevented that, Dante limped over to the couch and fell down onto it with a grunt of pain. His head rested against a soft pillow and he turned his head and watched as Hezen disappeared into the hallway for a few minutes. She returned with a bright orange bottle in her right hand and a glass of water in the other.

"Sit up," she ordered.

Dante sat up and she handed him the bottle. He took a look at it and found it was some kind of prescription medicine with a bit of a thick liquid in the bottom of it. Bringing it up to his nose, he took a quick whiff and soon his nose filled with the familiar scent of pineapples.

"Just take all of it." Hezen stood back up and stretched upwards.

Doing what the doctor told him to do, he opened the bottle and chugged the rest of what was inside of it. The bitter taste burned the back of his throat and tickled his tongue so he took a quick swing of his water. Once he was done, he pushed the bottle away and Hezen retrieved everything.

"Give that a while," she said as she took the glass back. "You might fall asleep but you'll feel better when you wake up."

"Whatever." Dante fell back against the couch once more.

She sighed and closed her eyes for a long minute. "You're grateful." Hezen turned away from Dante and walked into the kitchen. She returned a moment later with an ashtray in hand, silver lighter, and a white cigarette. Flopping down in the computer chair, she lit the end of her cigarette. "You heal pretty slowly for a demon."

Dante laughed and covered his eyes with his forearm. "You're smarter then you look. How did you figure _that_ out?"

"Easy." Hezen took a puff off of her cigarette. "Besides the fact that Enzo was looking around for you at the hospital, the stab wound you got from a fight healed right in front of me. On top of that, there was glass in your face and your skin had healed over it. Don't worry I got it out."

Dante closed his eyes. "Thanks I guess."

"No big deal. You want some new boxers? That's the only thing I kept on you." Hezen pointed to his black boxers, white stick between her index and middle finger. "There's blood on the back of it."

"Later." Dante moved the hand over his face back and forth.

Hezen let go of a small smile. "Get some sleep."

Dante's eyes became heavy once more from the medicine he had just taken. He removed his arm from his face and cast his attention over towards Hezen once more, and hoped that she wouldn't do anything to him while he was sleeping, good or bad. Just before he blinked for the last time, he caught a shine coming off of a golden ring on her left ring finger.

_Married._ He thought as he suppressed a laugh.

xXx

Dante opened his eyes once more, the feeling of warmth fleeing from his body. A taste of cotton entered his mouth and he tried swallowing it away but it didn't work. He blinked a few times when he didn't recognize his surroundings but soon the memory of that strange woman came back to him. What was her name again? Hezen? Turning his head he looked in the direction of the computer chair, where he last saw her, and found it empty. Where had she gone?

He sat up and sniffled only to find out that his nose had decided to plug up while he slept. Bringing his hands to his face, he rubbed his temples, and then dragged his hands down his face, moving his features downwards.

_Where'd she go?_ His fever thumped away in his head.

"Meow!"

Again the black cat lay on the end of the couch near his feet. He moved his right foot around a bit with a baby blue blanket over it and after a few minutes the cat began pawing at the bulge his foot created. The cat's paws smacked the bump, its tail twitching around as its lime green eyes dilated.

The front door opened, and then closed, the familiar _creaking_ noise catching Dante's attention. Hezen came around the corner with a blue basket filled with laundry in her arms. As she walked in, she caught Dante looking at her and sitting up like nothing had happened to him.

She placed the laundry basket down on the ground beside her. "Well how are you feeling?" she asked.

"Sick," he answered, his voice sounding funny because of his stuffed up nose.

Hezen sighed and turned her attention to the covered windows. "It's raining still; I wouldn't go out if I were you."

"Thanks for the advice." Dante rolled his eyes.

"Are you going to follow doctor's orders and stay in? Or do I have to start packing for you now?" She placed her hands on her hips and frowned. "You can't fight demons like this."

He flinched at her words, and glared towards her. Who was she to judge him like that? She had no idea who he was! "How are you figuring all this out about me?"

"I _told_ you." This time she took the turn to roll her eyes toward the ceiling. "Enzo spilled _everything_ to me about you being a demon hunter. I figured out you were a demon using what I discussed with you before."

"Do you know something you're not telling me?" Dante moved, getting ready to lunge at her if she tired to pull anything.

"I know my way around demons, trust me." Hezen bent down to the laundry basket, picked it up, and carried it into the dinning room.

The room fell into a sudden awkward silence neither one of them were too fond of. Dante could hear her moving things around and flapping the clothes out to get rid of the wrinkles. He fell back against the couch and closed his eyes for a moment, an image of his mother lining the back of his eyelids.

_Why is this brothering me? _Dante thought as his head pounded away, a forewarning of a headache. _Why do I keep thinking about my Mother?_

"Are you staying or not?" Hezen asked, breaking through Dante's thoughts. He reopened his eyes and saw her still folding clothes. "I've finished washing all of your clothes and I have to pick up your coat in a half an hour."

"I don't care." Dante coughed.

Hezen walked over to Dante with a pile of his clothes in her right hand he recognized as belonging to him. She placed them down beside the couch and stood back up.

"Stay then." Hezen crossed her arms over her chest. "You can't even think straight. You want anything to eat?"

"No," Dante hissed as he rolled over to face the couch.

This cold he had caught was getting the better of him. The headache that had threatened him a moment before decided to come full on, had lost his appetite, and his nose was beginning to become sore. He hadn't been this sick in ages, and he blamed it on his human side.

Hezen walked over to him, and felt Dante's forehead. He wasn't as warm as he had been before but he still had an uncomfortable warmth to his head. "Get some sleep. You're welcome to anything in the refrigerator and if you need me, I'll be in my room," she said. "I don't have to go to work for a while unless I get called in. If I do, I'll leave a note alright?"

"Fine, fine." Dante covered himself with a few blankets.

Hezen walked over to the computer in the room and turned it off. She walked around the room, turning off all of the lights and slightly walked out of the front door to pick up Dante's coat.

It was so quiet now. Everything in the small apartment had been turned off, and all Dante could hear was the sound of rain hitting the ceiling. He still had no idea where he was, what Enzo was doing or when he'd be able to be strong enough to leave and risk being attacked by demons. He was stuck here.

_I've got a warm bed, which is better then what's back at the shop._ Dante thought as he drifted off into sleep. _I'll just think of this as a little vacation._

xXx

Hezen walked back into her apartment two hours later with a bag in her hands. The cat that had been sleeping with Dante ran over to her and rubbed against her right leg with loving affection. "Hey Pena," Hezen whispered. "Are you watching our guest?"

"Meow."

Hezen smiled down at the cat, and moved down the hallway to check up on Dante. She saw him sleeping, and turned back around to go back into her own room. Finally that irritating child had fallen asleep! Sighing, Hezen grabbed a hanger out of the closet and hung Dante's bright red coat on the shower curtain rod to prevent wrinkles. But as she stepped back to get a better look at the coat, an overwhelming feeling of regret ran through her. This wasn't right, that boy was far too young to be going so dangerous everyday.

_He's a devil hunter._ Hezen thought as she looked over Dante's coat. _Just like Evern._

With another sigh, Hezen left the bathroom and Dante's coat and strolled over to her turned down bed. She jumped down into the welcoming sheets as Pena hopped up along with her and cuddled beside her stomach.

"Night Pena," Hezen whispered.

Pena crawled up against Hezen's warm stomach and closed her eyes, drifting off into a deep sleep. The brown haired girl looked up at her cat, smiled, and closed her eyes.

xXx

_Rrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnggggggggg._

_What?_ Dante stirred from his sleep. _Is that the phone?_

_Rrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnggggggggg._

Dante pushed the covers off of himself and looked around the room. There, in the kitchen, he spotted a small green light blinking on and off. He left the couch, still limping, and entered the kitchen in search of the light.

_Rrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnggggggggg._

He found a white cordless phone, grabbed it, and pressed a small button on the right side of the phone. "Hello?" he asked without thinking.

"_Dr. Major_?" a male voice asked on the other side.

"Hold on a sec."

Dante walked down the hallway, feeling that his leg was feeling a bit better now, and opened Hezen's door without knocking. He marched over to the side of her bed, bent over, and shook her until she woke up.

"What?" she asked.

"Phone." He handed the white receiver in her direction, his fever doubling his vision again.

Hezen sat up and grabbed the phone. "Hello?"

Dante left the room without saying anything else and figuring that she would want to be left alone while she talked on the phone. He walked back into the living room and fell back onto the couch, ready to get the rest of the sleep that he needed. The darkness began to come back as he closed his eyes when Hezen came back into the room.

"I've got a thirty eight hour shift," she said, looking around the apartment for items, "so stay or leave if you want, just lock the door if you do leave. Can you please feed Pena? Just whenever you want."

"Fine," he mumbled, stuffing his face in his pillow.

Hezen walked over towards Dante and felt his forehead once more. His fever hadn't completely disappeared, but it was much better when it had been a few hours ago. "Good it's almost gone." She sighed. "Make sure you drink the orange juice in the refrigerator and some water to make you feel better."

"Yes doctor," Dante answered with his usual sarcastic tone.

"Alright then." She disappeared into the kitchen and grabbed a bag. "I'll see you."

Dante moved his arm back and waved to her. Hezen turned away from him, and left the apartment, via the front door. He heard the front door lock, and Pena gracefully entered the room and looked up at Dante.

"Meow!! Meow!!"

"Not now," Dante moaned. "Later!"

"MEOW!"

Dante groaned and sat up. Entering the kitchen, he looked through all of the brown cabinets until he found a round can of cat food. The cat stood next to a small white bowl sitting in the corner of the kitchen, waiting for the mercenary. With a groan, Dante opened the can and dropped the food into the bowl, and threw the can away.

"Happy?" he asked. "Damn."

Everything grew quiet once more, not the quiet that he had heard before, but a different kind of silence that felt a grogginess through him. Wanting to know where all of his things were so he could get ready to leave, he walked into Hezen's room and looked around. He spotted his coat hanging and figured that he'd leave when he felt a bit better. As he walked out, his eye snagged on a small framed picture on the stand that he hadn't noticed before.

It was a picture of the woman he knew as Hezen and a man. The two stood beside one another, the man's arms around Hezen's shoulders and her arm around his waist. The man had black hair that fell down in a style that matched his own, and bright green eyes. The man wore a camouflage outfit, along with a dark green helmet.

_This must be her husband. Wonder where he is?_ Dante blinked as he studied the picture.

Feeling sick and tired once more, Dante put the picture down and walked back into the living room where he laid back down once more. He pulled the covers up to his chin once more, and listened to the rain hit the ceiling once more.

He didn't know why but for some reason, even though it was quiet, there felt as if there was someone else there. He didn't know if it was the company of the cat, or the fact that he knew _someone_ was coming _back_.

_Forget it I need sleep._ He figured. _I'm leaving as soon as I get better.

* * *

_

R&R please!


	2. Old Memories

Thanks for the reviews!

Enjoy!

* * *

Dante woke up hours later to find that he was still alone. He sat up and could feel that his nose had cleared up a great deal compared to what it had before, and his headache had finally passed him.

_Finally_. Dante yawned. _I can leave now. About damn time._

He got up, throwing his blankets off of him and grabbed the clothes on the floor next to him. Grabbing his pants he placed them back on, walked into Hezen's room and wrapped his hands around his coat. He strolled back into the living room, grabbed his guns and sword when he noticed that his amulet was sitting on the table.

His amulet had fallen off during an earlier fight so he had placed it in his coat pocket in order not to lose it. He had planned to fix it when he returned back to the shop but he had gotten into a drinking contest with someone at the bar and ended up here. Hezen must have taken it out of his coat pocket before she had taken it to the dry cleaner.

_At least she has some consideration._ Dante thought as he placed the amulet back in his pocket. With nothing left to do, he traveled over to the front door and grabbed the doorknob.

"Meow!" Pena rubbed against his legs.

"See ya kitty." Dante gently petted her with his right hand.

He turned the knob and pushed on the door until opened enough for him to slip out without letting Pena out. Pulling the door now, he closed it and for the first time since he had arrived found out that he was on the fourth floor of an apartment building.

_Shit._ He studied the staircase he around him. _This place is bigger then I thought._

A light blue carpet lined the floors with a red line running down what he figured was a walkway. He looked at the steps beside him and began walking down them until he reached the lobby in the front. He walked by the people giving him strange looks and out of the front doors to find that it was _still_ raining outside.

_When will this damn rain end?_ Dante looked up towards the sky and then looked back down towards the ground. _I'd better check up on Enzo._

xXx

Dante entered the same bar he had gotten so drink from a few nights ago and found Enzo sitting on a bar stool talking to the barkeeper. Muffled voices filled the small wooden bar along with a conversation two men were having on a nearby TV. The smell of alcohol traveled into his nose along with the smell of pizza. The pizza smell triggered his stomach to growl; when was the last time he had something to eat? With a smile on his face, Dante walked over and sat in the seat beside him.

"Dante!!" Enzo said happily as he turned to him. "Where have you been? You've been gone for five days!"

"Five days." Dante blinked. "Damn that was longer then I thought."

"You bet your ass it was!" Enzo took a quick shot, then slammed the shot glass onto the bar. "You lost two jobs on that little vacation you took!"

"Yeah, yeah." Dante moved his hand back and forth.

He didn't want the jobs to tell the truth. There had been something wrong with the way he had been fighting for the past month or so, his dormant demon side kept overcoming him and causing him more bad then good with urges he didn't understand. All he wanted and needed was money to keep his shop open but his demonic thoughts and urges had come to play for whatever reason.

"So the girl you were staying with," Enzo began, breaking Dante's thoughts, "how was she?"

Dante rolled his eyes, catching the innuendo. "I didn't do _anything_."

"But she was a doctor!" Enzo laughed, a blush from the alcohol crossing his face. "She could have taken care of all your problems with _that_ kind of money!"

The white haired man ignored his coworker's rambling and began to think. For someone who worked as a doctor, Hezen didn't seem to have many personal belongings. The only expensive looking thing in her apartment was the computer and other then that, she didn't have a TV or anything along those lines.

"She was a cutie," Enzo said with a laugh.

Dante sighed. This was _not_ work and did not need to be discussed as work. "Do you have any jobs for me or not?"

Enzo shook his head. "Not now Dante! Just head back to the shop so I can find ya this time when a job comes up."

"Fine." Dante stood up, and marched out of the bar, leaving Enzo to pay for the untouched drink he had ordered.

xXx

Dante finally arrived back at his shop and threw off his jacket. The smell of beer and pizza he had grown accustom to in the bar left the minute he walked in, being replaced by the distant order of old, molded food and rotten milk; Enzo hadn't been taking care of the place like he had promised. Enzo never kept up on his promises to clean; Dante wondered why he even trusted that man sometimes.

"Shit," Dante hissed.

He ignored everything and took the small flight of stairs up to his bedroom. He opened the door to a small room with a mattress without sheets and a TV sitting at the foot of the bed, sitting on top of a wooden box he had snatched from a nearby fruit stand. A ceiling fan creaked above him as the broken gray shades moved in the wind.

"Good to be home."

The bed creaked as he jumped on the mattress, found remote, and turned on the TV with the cable he was stealing from the people next door. He turned up the TV as loud as he could and began watching but then, something began nagging at him. With the TV pumping away with sound, it wasn't getting any better. Dante rolled over onto his side but his pants just didn't seem to fit right. Again he rolled but nothing felt _right_. Something was wrong but what?

The silence.

It kept annoying him. The moment he had come into the shop it had been dead quiet. He rolled over, trying to get comfortable but couldn't find a spot he liked. He could hear every noise the wooden flooring made, and the squeaks coming from the ceiling fan. The rain outside hit the scrap metal outside, creating dripping noises that wouldn't stop.

"Dammit." Dante covered his head with the pillows lying around him.

_I need a shower._ Dante stood up and walked into the dirty bathroom.

The small bathroom had a sink, a toilet with brown rust rings, and a shower missing a shower curtain and with dirty glass doors. He looked in the cabinet underneath the sink to find that the pipe had leaked and all of his towels were now wet.

"Goddammit." He slammed the cabinet door.

Running his hands through his hair, he found a single towel hanging from the shower door. He figured that it was better then nothing and opened the shower doors and turned the knob. Nothing came out.

"Oh come on!" Dante kicked the tub but it didn't change anything. "Damn water bill."

It seemed, for some reason that he was forgetting to do more and more of what he considered "human" things. He forgot to pay his bills, never kept things up or fixed anything that broke, and hadn't been as social has he had been before. He was losing touch with everything and anything that had to do with the human world.

Dante stormed out of the bathroom mumbling to himself as he flopped back down into his bed. His hands found a think blanket and pulled it over his head to try and create some kind of sound.

Something still bothered him. He tried searching through his mind to figure out what was wrong but the only word he could come up with was lonely. There wasn't going to be anyone coming home, there wasn't anyone to talk to, and there wasn't any cat to meow or rub against him. He was all alone.

_You'd think I'd be used to this._ Dante pushed his face deeper into his pillow.

The silence pounded away at his ears over and over again as he tried to fall asleep. Every noise irritated his ears and after trying to fall asleep for an hour, he finally archived his goal and fell into a deep sleep…

xXx

_The rain slammed against the rooftops of Dante's house, and a chilling wind blew, hard, through the trees and fallen leafs. Dante sat on his family's couch with a seven year old Vergil, and his mother sitting across from them, knitting something together as she always did. Secretly Dante hoped that the knitting was for him, he had lost his sweater in the school yard before Christmas break began and he found himself shivering in the night without it. _

"_Mom?" Dante asked, his legs pressed against his chest. "When will the rain stop?"_

"_Soon," Eva answered back. _

"_I want the power back on." Vergil sighed and leaned against the couch. "I'm going to bed, are you coming Dante?"_

"_Uh." Dante looked towards his mother, then at the darkness around her. "Maybe a little later."_

"_Fine." Vergil stood up and walked into the darkness Dante was afraid to walk through._

_Dante and his mother sat there for a few moments, and then Eva stood and walked over to the smaller twin. She moved her right arm and wrapped it around him, pulling him closer. "It's alright to be afraid of the dark," Eva whispered. "It's okay to be afraid of the rain." _

"_It's not the rain." Dante buried his face into his knees. "It's the dark. I don't like when it's dark like this. Vergil's not afraid."_

"_So?" Eva smiled. "Everyone's afraid of something different. You'll be fine."_

_The small image of Dante was suddenly replaced by the older version of Dante that he saw when he now looked into the mirror. Now sat there with his mother, afraid of the darkness. "The darkness," Dante began, "is just so lonely." _

xXx

Dante snapped out of his sleep, panting with his mouth wide open and eyes dilated. His eyes searched the all too familiar room but he didn't blink at first, instead it took a few seconds for him to start blinking again. Sweat fell from his nose; as he looked around the dark room, his chest heaving from his heavy breathing.

The darkness had not left, nor had the rain or silence.

Dante shook his head. _I gotta get the hell out of here. _

He jumped out of bed, walked out of his bedroom, and then walked out of the shop, grabbing his coat and all of his accessories as he did so. He walked through the rain, which had begun to come down harder, and headed towards the bar.

xXx

Dante soon found himself standing in front of the bar he and Enzo often hung out in and discovered that the lights had gone out. In fact on the way over, he noticed that most of the lights were out but he thought that it just might have been because it was so late at night. Had the rain knocked out all of the lights? Just like in his dream?

He shook his head, dismissing his thoughts. _Damn. All the lights are out around here man. Now where the hell am I supposed to go?_

He didn't want to go home. He didn't want to be alone in the darkness again. There wasn't a place for Dante to go, not a place that would be like his home where his mother and brother would be. Why couldn't a place like that exist for him? He wasn't asking for much, just a he be doomed to forever be alone?

_Shit._

Dante turned away from the bar with a grin on his face, and began walking down the street with his head lowered. He walked through the streets for hours, not knowing where he was going to go or end up. This darkness…this is where he had to live. He was a demon, the darkness was his home.

"_It's the dark. I don't like when it's dark like this"_

_The darkness._ Dante closed his eyes for a long minute. _This is where my father lived. Maybe it's the same place where I should live. As a demon._

When Dante looked up after walking and thinking, he found himself outside of the apartment building he had left earlier. There would be no strange silence there. It was warm there, and no nightmares would haunt him there. Up four stories was a small light and, he knew it came from Hezen's apartment.

xXx

Hezen stood on the small balcony outside of her apartment with her eyes on the cloudy sky above her. The screen door had been left closed, leaving Pena standing by it, watching her master look outside towards the falling rain as she stood amongst the towels Hezen had torn down in order to get outside.

"Meow!"

Hezen turned back around and entered her apartment again. She closed the screen and glass door behind her, locked it, and strolled over to the couch still covered in blankets and pillows. Grabbing a book, Hezen flopped down on the couch and scooted over to a large white candle she had going.

"Don't worry Pena," Hezen said as opened her thick book. "The sun will be up soon and then we'll be able to head off to bed."

Shifting her glasses around, Hezen focused down on the book and began reading in the spot she had left off on. Her mind dissolved into the story written beneath her and just as she became comfortable, a loud knocking came to the front door. The noise jumped her out of her reading, and waited until another strong knock echoed through the quiet apartment.

"Dammit," she hissed. "Who the hell is here at three in the morning?"

Hezen tossed her book down onto the couch and stomped over to the front door. Didn't the person knocking care about the neighbors? She didn't need another noise complaint from the people next door. She looked through the peak hole and there stood Dante, water dripping from his body. Sighing, she unlocked the door and opened it.

"It's only been a few hours," she looked up and down his body, "and you come to me the same way I found you."

"Can I just come in?" Dante asked with an annoyed tone.

"Sure." She stepped to the side, allowing him to enter.

Dante walked into the apartment once more, and then Hezen closed the door behind him and locked it up. "Go change, you don't want to get sick again," she said, her eyes still on the door.

"I need clothes to do that."

True. Hezen rolled her eyes and moved into her room, the white haired demon following behind her. When she arrived in the room, she again grabbed a hanger out of her small closet and held her right hand out towards Dante as she pressed her lips into a firm line.

"Coat."

Following her orders, Dante took off his jacket and handed it to her. She placed it on the hanger, and placed it on the shower curtain rod to dry again. That done Hezen walked by Dante and back into the closet. She searched through the things there, Dante approached, craning his neck to see what the black haired woman was doing. After a minute or two, Hezen pulled out a cardboard box with the words _Evern's stuff_ written on the side in black ink.

"You'll need to wear something now that the power is out." Hezen stood back up and cracked her back. "The heat is out right now and you don't need to get sick again. Are you hungry?"

His stomach growled at the mention of food. "Yeah."

Hezen opened the flaps of the box and pushed it towards the white haired man. "Take whatever you want. If you find something in the pockets, just throw it back in the box."

"Whatever."

She strolled out of the room without another word, leaving Dante to go through the clothing. Bending over he searched through large collection of clothing in the box and found a pair of boxers and a pair of jeans he liked.

_These must belong to her husband._ Dante looked up and down the jeans; now that he looked at them they appeared a bit too big around the waist for him. _I wonder why his clothes are in a box?_

Dante looked over to the picture sitting on top of the dresser of Hezen and who he figured to be her husband at the thought of the pants being his. The military outfit gave him the impression that he must have been out training or perhaps he was in the air force or in military school. Where was he? Why hadn't he come home yet? Then an idea hit him: What if her husband had died in action?

_This is none of my business. _

Remembering what she said, he searched through the pockets but found nothing. He took his old clothes off, having a bit of trouble because his clothes were wet, and then slipped on the new clothes. The clothes felt a bit stiff but he moved his legs a little bit more and figured they would loosen up. It felt a bit weird to wear clothing that belonged to a potentially dead man, but what else was he going to do? He didn't want to run back out into the rain just to gathering clothing…

Dressed as much as he usually was, Dante walked back into the living room and sat down on the couch while Hezen moved around in the kitchen. He began getting comfortable when she handed him a bag that looked as if it had come from a movie theater.

"This is food?" Dante asked as he twitched.

"It's the only thing I have that doesn't need to be cooked," she hissed.

"You don't have any cookies or crackers or anything?" Dante raised his right eyebrow.

"No." She shook her head. "I really don't get time to shop."

"_I've got a thirty-eight hour shift."_

Dante blinked, with a thirty-eight hour shift, who would have time to go shopping with a job schedule like that? "I guess you wouldn't."

He reached his hand down into the popcorn bag and grabbed a handful of the greasy, cold popcorn. Taking his hand out of the bag, he brought it up to his mouth and tasted the popcorn for the first time. He grimaced at the soft and bitter taste but managed to swallow it in one large gulp.

"Ick." Dante chewed with his mouth open as the taste grew. "How old is this?"

"Dunno." Hezen shrugged. "Want something to drink?"

"Got beer?"

"No, it rots your soul," Hezen answered as she walked back into the kitchen.

"Soda?"

"Rots your teeth."

"Juice?" Dante sighed.

"I got that."

"Yeah, I'll take that then."

Hezen opened her refrigerator, took out the juice and found that there was only a bit left in it. She sighed, and gave it to Dante, and then sat down on the computer chair once more.

"That's the last of it." Hezen shook her head back and forth. "I really need to go shopping but I've got _another_ shift tomorrow."

"How long?" Dante opened the juice cap and took a drink.

"Fourteen hours." Hezen crossed her legs. "I've got six hours to sleep now and I had a nap at the hospital."

"When'd you get home?"

"An hour ago."

He moved the popcorn bag out to her. "Hungry?"

"No." She moved her right hand back and forth. "I ate at the hospital a few times and right before I left."

"Ew hospital food." Dante shivered. He had hospital food once in his life that he could remember, he was around eight when he broke his arm and Eva took him to a hospital. Unfortunately, his arm healed in front of the doctor, freaking him out but a nurse insisted that they stay over night.

Hezen stood up. "I'm going to bed. Are you going to be here when I wake up or not?"

"Dunno." Dante shrugged. "Hey," he stopped chewing the soft popcorn, "you want me to go shopping?"

"Why?" Hezen laughed a bit.

Dante leaned against the couch. "Hey as long as I'm gonna stay here there'd better be food here. You want anything special?"

Hezen crossed her arms. "And are _you_ going to pay for it?"

Dante fell quiet. She was right, he didn't have that much money, well not enough to stock an apartment for two people and a cat.

Hezen smiled. "You have a checking account?"

"In my old name."

"Good enough."

She walked over to her bag sitting in the dining room and pulled out her checkbook. She began to write something down, and when she was finished, she ripped out the check and handed it to him.

"Cash it tomorrow. Spend a few on groceries and keep the rest to keep yourself on your feet."

Dante took the check and looked over it: two thousand dollars. There it was, two thousand dollars sitting right there in his hands when just a few seconds ago he had absolutely nothing but the lint lining his pockets. He was about to place it somewhere safe when he noticed that the name was blank.

"Tony Redgrave," Dante said, handing the check back to Hezen.

"Right."

She wrote the name on top of the check and at the bottom on the memo line wrote "gift". Leaning forward, she gave it back to him and then went back into the dining room to put everything back she had taken out.

"Just cash it tomorrow, shop, and keep the rest." she said, coming back into the room. "I'm going to bed."

"Night."

Dante sat there eating the old popcorn and drinking the last of the juice when Pena looked over at him. Hezen closed the bedroom door and Pena's nice look changed to a glare. "Ya know demon hunter you're pretty lucky I'm here," Pena said with a sudden deep male voice.

Dante dropped his bag of popcorn as his jaw dropped showing the chewed corn in his mouth. "Did you just talk?"

"Yeah I did."

xXx

Hezen fell into her unmade bed and closed her eyes. For one more moment she opened her eyes and looked at the brown cardboard box Dante had left out. The clothes in the box belonged to _him_ and yet someone else was wearing them. Some man she had just randomly picked up on the street, who had no idea who the previous owner was.

_It's nice,_ Hezen began to think, _to see someone else wearing his clothes again.

* * *

_

R&R please!


	3. This Connection

Thanks for all of the reviews! I will take all of them to heart! Anyways, enjoy this new chapter!

* * *

"Yeah I just talked," Pena said repeated, the sly smirk never leaving his cat lips. "I'm stuck in this damn body because my master's husband."

There was no way a cat, a plain everyday house cat could speak. What kind of cat was this? Dante had seen plenty of strange things in his life, thanks to his demon heritage, but he had never expected something like this.

"Stuck?" Dante asked, blue eyes wide.

"Yeah!" Pena hissed. "Evern was a devil hunter and he was huntin' me one day and locked me in this damn body! This is where _you_ come in. I want you to get me out."

"How?"

"You don't know the retrieval spell?" Pena raised a paw.

He shook his head. "No."

"Damn." Pena turned away from Dante, giving the white haired boy his backside. "Your brother did. In fact it's partly your brother's fault I'm inside this body."

A shock ran through Dante. Before he could stop himself, he jumped out of his seat and shot a glare in the cat's direction. His hands formed fists at his sides, his fingernails digging into the palms of his hands. "How do you know Vergil?"

"He was Evern's partner for a while." Pena laughed. "That was until Evern gave up being a demon to become human."

Dante walked over to the cat and picked it up by the skin on it's back much like a mother cat would do to a kitten. He turned the cat around in his hand, and made Pena face him, until their noses touched. "Tell me _everything_ you know," Dante hissed.

"Whoa, whoa I wouldn't pull anything if I were you." The hair on Pena's tail stood, and the fur along his spine began standing. "You kill me and you'll be out of here just as quickly as you came in."

Why did the cat think more logically then he did? Following the cat's orders, he placed the cat down on the floor and flopped back down on the couch. Dante changed his posture, he leaned forward on his knees and focused on the cat. Pena shook and then stood, looking at the larger demon.

"Do you know about that old story that if a demon kills a thousand angels, they'll become humans as punishment?" Pena began.

"Now I do," Dante answered sarcastically with a roll of his eyes.

"That's what Evern was doing. He didn't want to be immortal as demons are to the point of having their hearts ripped out but anyways," the cat moved it's right paw, "he wanted to become human. It took him five years but he did it, and in the last year he was working with your brother, Vergil."

His heart seemed frozen even though he could hear his heartbeat like drum in his ear. Had the cat really said that? Was he telling the truth? Dante hadn't heard his brother's name coming from someone else's mouth in ages. It was strange to finally meet someone else who knew his brother and talked of him when he had thought Vergil had been dead for so long.

"I was wanted because I had done something stupid so Evern killed me and sealed me away in here with Vergil's help." Pena sighed and lowered his head. "Evern had run over the cat in this body before me and so I was put in here to keep Hezen happy. I hate this body, it's not even the right gender dammit."

"You're in a female body?" Dante's cheeks puffed up as he tried to hold back the laughter clawing at his throat.

Pena shot daggers at the demi-demon. "Make fun of me and I'll slit your throat in the middle of the night," Pena said as he hissed.

"Fine, fine." Dante moved his hand back and forth, dismissing what he had said before. "Now what the hell are you talking about that you're lucky you're here?"

"Huh." Pena started cleaning himself. "I put a barrier up around this place so demons wouldn't be able to sense you. Now the barrier I have up _won't_ stop devils, only demons so don't do anything stupid."

"Whatever." Dante shrugged. "Don't worry about anything, I'm not gonna do something stupid."

"That grin on your face says otherwise." Pena turned away from the white haired man. "All I'm saying is to be careful. I don't want you bringing any demons or devils around here."

"I _told_ you." Dante placed his hands on his hips and shifted his weight to his right leg. "Don't worry. Now go do whatever it is that you do."

Dante began to eat the popcorn he had dropped a few moments ago and found himself growing tired. He put the bag on the floor and picked up the juice carton once more. He brought it above his head and shook it only to discover that he had already emptied the container.

"Damn." He sighed.

"Huh." Pena jumped onto the computer's chair and laid down. "I'll be watching you."

"I don't care." Dante fell back onto the couch and looked up at the ceiling. Seeing Pena out of the corner of his eye irritated him so he rolled over to face the wall and pulled the covers up to his neck.

He started falling asleep when he noticed that something felt…out of place. Thinking it over, Dante named hundreds of things but nothing really fit the description. Then, it hit him: no longer did he hear that annoying silence. Here, for some reason, he felt warmth. Perhaps it was because he wasn't alone, there was another person just beyond a wall ready to talk to him and keep him company.

_Maybe now I can get some _good _sleep. _Dante thought before he faded away into sleep.

xXx

Dante woke up to the sound of knocking. He sat up, still dazed and looked around the room to see Pena walking out of the kitchen with small bits of wet cat food still stuck to his chin.

"Someone's at the door!" Pena said as he walked by Dante, licking his lips. "Get it already! Damn you're lazy!"

"Shut it."

Dante stumbled off of the couch and walked over to the front door. His fingers searched for the knob as his left hand brushed through his hair once to make sure that it was tolerable. He found the knob, and twisted it, opening it to another man.

"Hello?" Dante asked, leaning against the doorway.

The man at the door looked at Dante through a pair of circled purple glasses, but Dante couldn't tell what kind of look the strange man was giving. The man's bright red hair sat pulled back in a high ponytail, and contrasted against the dark black raincoat he wore. "Is, uh, Hezen home?" the man asked, raising a red eyebrow towards Dante.

"No." He shook his head.

The man sighed and turned his head to the right. "Alright, could you do me a favor and give this to her?" He handed a small envelope to Dante. The white haired man took the envelope and got ready to close the door.

"Thanks." The other man turned away, and began to walk down the nearby stairs.

Dante closed the door and walked back into the living room. He set the envelope down on the table in the dinning room when he noticed a note sitting there, waiting for him, along with a set of keys.

_If you're gonna go shopping before I get back, here are the keys to my other car. It's a silver jeep with a stick shift, which I hope you know how to drive. Don't do anything stupid in it. With the car keys is a key to the apartment, which you'll need to get back in so have fun moving the food up four stories._

_With food, just don't buy things with too much garlic in it, it irritates my stomach to hell. And no fish, I hate fish. That's about it, get whatever I'm sure I'll find something to eat in what you bring in._

_-Hezen-_

"So who was at the door?" Pena asked as he jumped onto the table.

"Some guy with red hair." Dante shook his head, still a bit tired.

"Must have been Krain." Pena began itching himself with his right rear leg. "He's Hezen's resident over at the hospital. What did he want?"

Dante moved his hand towards the envelope and Pena walked over to it. The cat pawed at it with his nails out, and cut through the thin paper revealing a card underneath. Pawing at it more, he saw the words, "get well soon!" in thick, blue letters.

"A get well soon card?" Pena asked out loud. "Huh, he's nicer then I thought."

"Why is he giving her a card?" Dante cocked an eyebrow.

"She's been getting sick lately." Pena jumped off of the table and strolled away without a care in the world. "Like throwing up and small fevers, things like that. Personally I think it was because she was taking care of you when you were sick."

Dante twitched. If she was sick, he didn't know what he would do, he hadn't really taken care of another human being when it came to something like the flu. She had put her health on the line to take care of him and now she had fallen ill.

Feeling bad, Dante sighed. "I'm going shopping." Dante turned away from the cat.

"I need litter," Pena called out as he walked into Hezen's room.

Dante followed the cat and walked into Hezen's room. He looked through the box sitting on the floor and grabbed a black dress shirt. He slipped it on, buttoned it up, and walked back into the dinning room. Grabbing his wallet, and slipping it in his back pocket, he stepped towards the front door and opened it. "I'll be back," he said loud enough for Pena to hear.

"Have fun!!!" Pena yelled sarcastically.

Stepping out of the door, he closed it behind him and made sure that it was locked. He began his descent down the stairs and found the parking garage in a lower section. The lights in the parking garage were on, telling Dante that the power had finally returned to the city.

_Now to find her car._ Dante looked around the large parking lot. _A silver jeep… _

Holding the key in his fingers, he scanned up and down the lanes of cars until he spotted a silver jeep. He walked over to it, stuck the key into the driver's seat door, and turned it to find that it unlocked the door.

_Must be the right car._ Dante laughed.

He opened the door, and got into the seat. Taking a moment after he had closed and locked the door, he looked around the car to see how messy it was. There were empty sodas in the cup holders, empty soda boxes on the floor, along with papers, pens, and a broken CD.

_She's always so neat it seems._ Dante thought as he looked at the mess. _I wonder why her car is such a mess? _Remembering his mission, Dante the car and pulled out of the parking garage, trying to remember how to drive a stick.

xXx

Dante arrived at the grocery store and parked the jeep. He got out and walked over to the front of the store where he grabbed a shopping cart. Trying to ignore the squeaking from one of the broken wheels in the front. _Now I remember why I hate shopping._ Dante twitched.

Dante entered the store, cashed his check, and then walked about the store, looking for anything. Everything he saw made him hungry and then he remembered that he hadn't eaten anything before he came.

_Bad idea._ He thought with a sigh.

As he walked by other people and picked up food enough for himself, Hezen and the stupid talking cat, an odd feeling ran through him. He had never shopped for anyone else. Whenever he did go shopping he went for himself and only got a few things at a time but now he picked up more things, and sometimes picked up two of the same thing. There was just something about buying a lot of food and hoping that Hezen would like something he picked out caused a strange, unexplainable feeling inside of him.

"Hey Dante!"

Dante broke out of his thoughts and saw Enzo coming down the aisle he was in. Dante sighed, when he noticed that Enzo had a basket with a few bottles of wine, and a case of beer. Someone like Enzo was just too predicable.

"Uh hey." Dante managed a fake smile.

"I've been looking for you! I've got a job lined up for the both of us!" Enzo grinned. "Ya gonna take it?"

"When do I have to do it?"

"Tonight."

Dante looked away for a moment. He had to do his job; he couldn't be with Hezen or hide in Hezen's apartment forever. This was his duty, he had to kill as many demons as he could and try to find his brother.

"I'll do it." Dante looked back towards Enzo.

"Great!" Enzo walked closer towards Dante and looked into his cart. "Hey what's up with all of the food?" He narrowed his eyes and looked Dante in the eye. "Are you still hangin' around that doctor?"

"I'm just paying back something I owe her." The white haired man turned away from Enzo.

"Alright then." Enzo took a step away from Dante. "Come to the shop later and I can tell ya more of the details. Make sure you're there."

"I will be."

"See ya." Enzo turned away and walked towards the checkout lines in the front of the store.

"Yeah see ya," Dante said even though he knew that Enzo wouldn't be able to hear him.

Dante turned his chart away. His devil hunting life was bothering him even though he was here, trying to live through his human side for just a bit. When he went back to picking up food, he felt the strange feeling come back once more only this time; the thought of killing devils came back into his head.

Before he found himself liking being around Hezen, devil hunting was the only thing he had to keep his mind busy but now, for some reason, the feeling she gave him caused him to relax. Maybe it was because she let him do whatever he wanted, or maybe it was because she gave him the comfort that someone was waiting for him.

_I'd better hurry up._ Dante pushed the cart down the aisle.

xXx

"That will be one hundred and seventy five dollars," the cashier said, causing Dante to twitch.

"Right." Dante took out his wallet and handed the woman the money, still twitching from the fact that he had spent that much.

Everything had been bagged, and Dante stuffed the receipt down in a bag, not wanting to see how much he had spent again. He wheeled the cart out to the car, and placed everything in the trunk, closed it, and got into the driver's seat.

_I'll drop this off first, and then go to the shop._ Dante told himself as he backed out of his parking spot.

Wanting something to distract him from the thought of fighting devils, he reached over and turned on the radio once he had reached a red light. He pushed a numbered button to see if he'd get any kind of favorite setting but all of them were on the same, default setting.

_Must not listen to the radio that much._ Dante figured.

He searched until he found his station and turned it up loud enough to his liking. Happy that there was finally something in the background, he concentrated on driving once more.

xXx

After finally lugging each bag up four stories back to the apartment, and putting the frozen food into the freezer, Dante figured that it was time to go and do his job. He walked into Hezen's room to get his work clothing and found her lying on the bed, with her face to the side.

"Your back," Hezen said with a slight laugh. "I was wondering where you were."

"The food's out there," Dante said as he walked into the bathroom and slipped into his old clothing. "I didn't know where to put anything so I'm leavin' it up to you," he said from the bathroom.

After a quick change, Dante came back to where Hezen was lying and a faint redness on her face. He blinked, and sat down on her bed. "You feelin' alright?" he asked.

"Yeah." Hezen sighed. "I'll feel better after I throw up again."

"Again?"

"Yeah I must have eaten something that didn't agree with me at the hospital." Hezen rolled over to face Dante, her glasses shifted around a bit as she moved. "I'll be fine in a little while."

"Hospital food will do that to you," Dante teased, hoping it would make her feel a bit better.

"Thanks for buying food." Hezen moved her face back into the pillow.

Dante shrugged. "No big deal. I've got a job, I don't know when I'll be back."

"Fine." She moved her right hand back and forth. "Be careful and all of that jazz. Make sure you eat something before you leave, there are donuts sitting on the dining room table if you didn't notice."

"They aren't those nasty hospital donuts that made you sick are they?" Dante asked as he stood up.

Hezen laughed a bit though Dante couldn't hear it because of the pillow in her face. "No."

"Oh yeah," Dante turned around, "that guy, Krain came to the door looking for you."

Hezen brought her face away from the pillow. "I know thanks. Take the jeep again, it's raining and I'm tired of drying your wet clothes." The last part was said with a hint of playfulness behind it.

"Fine."

Dante walked towards the bedroom door, and grabbed the doorknob. But just as he closed the door, he threw another glance in Hezen's direction and saw her stretch her arms upwards.

"Don't get hurt," she said with strain as she continued to stretch.

"Won't."

Dante exited the room, and closed the door behind himself. He strolled into the dinning room and grabbed his twin guns, and his sword when Pena jumped on the table and glared towards him. "You forgot my litter," Pena hissed.

"Sorry. I'll get it later."

"You'd better! Or I might mistake your jacket for a litter box." Pena moved his paw out as if he were pointing to the red jacket Dante wore.

"Okay, okay!" Dante moved his hands back and forth. "I'll get it on my way back! Can you hold it in until then?"

"Oh piss off." Pena jumped off of the table and walked over to the couch where he laid down. "Bring litter home, not demons!!"

"Fine."

Dante grabbed a glazed donut and placed it in his mouth as he adjusted his belt and checked over his guns. Feeling that they checked out all right, he placed them in his holsters and walked towards the front door.

This where he would now fight and act like a devil. Grabbing the doorknob meant that he was ready to switch to his other side and forget his human weaknesses for a while, just to survive. For some reason, here, he felt somewhat torn.

_Forget it._ He shook his head.

He took a hold of the knob, and twisted it until the door opened. He took a step outside until he stood in the hallway, and closed the door behind himself, making sure that it was locked.

_Here goes nothing._ Dante took in a large breath.

xXx

A few moments later, Dante parked Hezen's jeep in front of his shop and walked in to find Enzo sitting on the ground, eating a pizza. Dante walked over to him and snatched a piece. "So what's this job you've got lined up for me?" Dante asked as he ate the pizza. It had a weird taste because of the donut he had just finished.

"Well," Enzo swallowed what he was chewing, "there's this new Hilton hotel downtown that's going to be loaded with rich people. I need you to get in there and get me a master key."

Dante's mouth dropped open. That couldn't be right! "That's my mission? I thought it was something serious Enzo! Come on!!"

"Business is slow!" Enzo protested as he rolled his eyes. "I'm givin' you all the missions I can right now, be grateful!"

"Fine," Dante hissed.

To be honest he was somewhat happy. The sooner he got this mission done and over with, the sooner he could get back to Hezen to make sure she was feeling better. The moment he thought about worrying about her, he froze. Why was her worrying about her? Why did he want to get back to see her?

When Dante came out of his thoughts he noticed Enzo's mouth moving. Focusing on his informant, he started paying attention once more and then another thought caught his attention. He just wanted to make sure she was okay because he felt as if it was his fault that she was sick. Did he just want to see her get better so he would have to feel so damn guilty?

_Is that really why?_ Dante asked himself.

"Dante?" Enzo said, waving his hand in front of Dante's blank face. "Dante! Come back Dante!"

"Damn." Dante shook his head. "Anyways, I'll get going. I'll bring you the key later tonight at the bar."

"Sounds fine." Enzo stood up. "By the way, where'd you get the jeep?"

"It's a friend's."

Enzo narrowed his eyes and leaned forward. "So how many times did you have to sleep with her before she started letting you use her car?"

"Shut up." Dante twitched.

* * *

R&R please! 


	4. Deep Enough

Thanks for the reviews!!

Enjoy!

* * *

Dante arrived in front of the new Hilton hotel and had broken in through the back door with relative ease. What kind of hotel left a place like this so easy to break into? He found his way to the security room and pushed all kinds of buttons until everything in the hotel shut down. Feeling confident now, he walked into the lobby and looked around. Searching all around he found that the hotel completely empty. There weren't even security guards walking around or very many lights. He couldn't understand why but he really didn't want to stand around and try to figure it out.

_Now where would they keep those key cards?_ Dante wondered as he looked around the large lobby he was standing in.

Dante had to admit that the place looked pretty nice. The lobby was large and opened up to the roof where it showed all twelve stories along the way. In front of him stood a large fountain with a pool of water waiting to be used underneath the large mermaid statue. To his right was the main desk, and to his left, a hallway leading to a parking garage.

_Nice place._ Dante grinned. _But I'd better not get distracted._

Dante walked over to the main desk and stepped behind it. He began to search through all of the papers on the desk when he found a pair of keys with a tag on it that read, "_Employee Room Keys_".

_Jackpot._

He placed the key ring on his index finger as he searched through the papers some more and found a single card key. Figuring that he might need that one as well, he placed it in his pocket and stepped out from behind the desk.

_Good enough._ Dante told himself. _Enzo can come and get it if he wants it that badly._

Dante began walking through the back door in order to leave when the lobby erupted with hot and humid air. He turned around and heard a loud, piercing scream. The sound of something hitting the ground behind him followed the scream. Dante prepared himself to jump forward when a large, heavy fist hit him in the face, sending him backwards.

Dante's body slammed against the wall, then hit the floor. Not wanting to be caught off guard, Dante stood, his knees shaking. "S-shit," Dante hissed.

When Dante focused his vision, he saw the monster that had hit him. The monster stood more then two feet above him with two large, round hands, which it had used to punch Dante and its legs were long, with claws for feet. It didn't seem to have eyes on it's face, all it seemed to have were two long slits which moved every few moments, telling Dante that the slits had to be nostrils. The rest of it's body remained covered in a dark red skin and veins pumping blood so hard that Dante could see them pumping through the skin.

"I guess this is why there isn't anyone here," Dante said with a slight laugh. "Big and ugly, you got something to say?"

The monster threw back its head and made a loud gargling noise.

"Fine." Dante reached down and grabbed his twin guns.

He moved his guns out towards the monster and pulled the trigger over and over again. The monster made the gurgling noise once more and ran to the right to get away from Dante's rain of bullets.

Dante smiled. "Runnin' 'eh?"

With a grin across his face and adrenaline running through every muscle in his body, Dante chased after the monster until it jumped up a wall, using it's claw like feet. Dante looked at it as the monster stopped once it was on the ceiling and scratched the back of his head with his gun.

"Now how am I supposed to get you up there?" Dante asked out loud. "Come back down!"

The monster came falling down from the ceiling and hit the floor with a loud crashing noise. Dante ran over to it with his guns out but it began to dissolve into black smoke until there was nothing left but a crack in the floor.

"What the hell?" Dante looked at the bare area. "Where did it go?"

He stood near the spot where the monster had disappeared and waited for anything, a noise, another monster but nothing happened. He sighed and waited and the air around him all of a sudden came back to its normal temperature and the humidity disappeared.

"I guess it's gone." Dante crossed his arms. "I've got better things to worry about."

Figuring that the monster was going to come back, Dante left the same way he had come and didn't bother to turn the security devices back on at the risk of the monster coming back and humans having to meet up with it.

xXx

Dante arrived at the bar Enzo promised to meet him in and found him drinking yet again. He walked up to the bar and placed the keys down onto the table with an open hand. "There I'm done," Dante said as Enzo twitched from how hard Dante had slammed the keys down.

"Damn Dante!" Enzo said, putting his hands up in the air as he jumped back a bit. "What's crawled up your ass and died?"

"Nothing." Dante cast his eyes heavenward. "I just want to get going alright? So do you have another mission for me?"

Enzo shook his head. "Not right now. I'll find ya when I've got one for you. Where can I get to you?"

"I don't know." Dante sighed as he closed his eyes. "You'll find me, don't worry about it."

Enzo looked at his favorite worker and saw that he was stressed out about something. He hated to see him stressed out or worried about anything so he patted the bar stool beside him. "Have a seat and a drink! I'll pay for it," Enzo offered.

"Nah." Dante moved his hand, dismissing Enzo's offer. "I've got something else to take care of. I'll see you later."

Dante turned away from Enzo with a grin on his face to cheer up the other man. Enzo managed to give him a grin back, and Dante stepped out of the bar, happy.

xXx

Dante parked Hezen's jeep and made his way back up to her apartment. He placed his keys into the doorknob, feeling happy that he now had entrance to her apartment whenever he wanted. Opening the door, Pena ran over to him with an excited look on his cat face.

"Litter!?"

"Oh." Dante twitched. "I forgot."

Pena glared. "Fine, I'm going to leave you a present sometime. You'd better check your pockets!"

The demi-demon moved his right hand back and forth, dismissing the cat. "Yeah, yeah."

Dante walked further into the apartment and placed his items down in the dining room. He slipped his red coat off and threw it over a chair when a strong smell caught his attention that he hadn't noticed before.

_What's that?_

After putting everything down he walked into the kitchen and found a plate of macaroni and rice waiting for him with a cup of juice next to it. He blinked as another strange feeling came to him.

"Is this—?"

"Yes," Pena interrupted as he strolled by. "It's yours, she left it out in case you came back hungry."

Dante blinked. No one but his mother had ever done that for him before. Someone else was thinking about him, and worrying about him enough to get up and do something. There was something sitting there, waiting for him that someone else had made even though she was ill.

He smiled and shook his head. He stepped into the kitchen, moved the food, and hopped onto the counter. Pena jumped up as well, and watched as Dante grabbed the food and began to eat after finding a small fork.

"I want some rice." Pena raised his right paw and hit Dante's leg.

"Huh." Dante shoved a full fork of rice and macaroni into his mouth and looked at the cat. "Only if you promise not to crap on my stuff."

"Fine, fine." Pena moved both of his paws onto Dante's legs and pushed himself towards Dante's face. "Just come on!"

Dante scooped another spoonful of rice and moved the fork over towards Pena. The cat moved over towards the fork and nipped at the rice there until the fork was bare. He took his fork back and began eating once more. Pena was looking up at him once more, and not wanting to feed him anymore, Dante shoved the rest of the food into his mouth and shrugged.

"Fine." Pena pushed away from Dante. "I don't wanna be around you anymore anyways! You smell like a demon!"

"I need to take a shower." Dante hopped off of the counter and placed the dishes in the sink.

"I could have told you that." Pena laughed.

Dante walked back into Hezen's room and saw that she was sleeping. He figured that the running water wouldn't wake her up and tiptoed by her. Getting into the bathroom, he left the door open a bit, and started the shower.

_A good shower._ Dante sighed. _This should be nice._

He took out three towels, and placed one down on the floor to prevent himself from slipping when he got out, and place the other two down on the floor. When the water warmed up enough, he slipped his close off, and stepped into the shower.

The water felt good against Dante's skin and sent a rush of relaxation all through his body. Why hadn't he thought of this earlier? The dirt that had collected on him from the last time he had showered and the blood slipped off of his skin and went down the drain. Remembering, he closed the shower curtain and looked around the shower for shampoo and soap. There in the right hand corner, stood a bottle of soap Dante picked up and studied.

_Cleans and closes pores. _Dante read. He popped open the top and smelled a strong smell that came close to dryer sheets. _Nice I guess. Like I care about what I smell like when a demon's attacking._

Figuring that it was better then nothing, he flipped over the bottle and squeezed a small amount into his right palm. He rubbed the soap all over his body, and then stood underneath the shower head and allowed all of the soap to run off of his body.

_Finally clean._

He grabbed the shampoo and poured some of the clear liquid into his palm and ran it into his hair. The shampoo reacted with the water and bubbled, allowing him to clean out the collection of blood he had gathered from fighting devils instead of taking a shower. Once his hair had bubbled enough, he stood underneath the shower and rinsed the soap out completely.

Dante stood underneath the warm water and began to relax once more when he heard a noise come from outside the shower curtain. It sounded like a spatter against water, and then the sound of someone coughing. Dante moved to the back of the shower, and pulled the curtain back to see Hezen over the toilet.

"Are you okay?" Dante asked.

She coughed once more and looked over towards him. Her eyes saw his lower, naked, abdomen and looked away and released a loud groan. "I _don't_ want to see that." Hezen flushed the toilet and coughed once more.

"Oh." A blush came over Dante's face for a moment as he grabbed the curtain and covered his lower half with it. "Are you alright?" he asked, getting back to the subject at hand.

"I will be." Hezen sighed and pulled away from the toilet seat.

She felt another chuck in her throat so she moved back over the toilet seat. The chunk came up and fell into the toilet as her breathing picked up. She began coughing once she finished throwing up, and rested her head against the seat as she tired to catch her breath.

"Sorry," she managed to say. "I know you've just finished eating."

Another chunk started to come up and she bent back over the toilet seat to prepare herself. Dante stood there and saw that her hair was going to end up getting into her face so he stepped out of the shower, wrapped a towel around his waist, and grabbed her hair. He gathered as much as he could and held it back as the chuck came up.

After a few moments of catching her breath and spiting into the toilet, Hezen flushed and sat back a bit. Dante released her hair, and moved back to the shower where he turned off the water.

"Thanks," Hezen said as she stood up. "I don't know what's bothering me."

"It's payback for the food." Dante shrugged.

Hezen stood up and walked over to the sink where she turned on the cold water. She cupped her hand underneath the water flow, and brought it into her mouth where she rinsed out her mouth and spit it down into the sink. After a few times of rinsing, she splashed water onto her face and relaxed a bit.

"Damn what did you eat?" Dante joked as he picked up a towel and began to dry off his hair.

"I don't know." She shook her head back and forth. "All that's coming up now is bile."

"Hum," Dante blinked, "maybe you should go to a doctor."

"I'm not going back to the hospital," Hezen groaned as she walked out of the bathroom without Dante. "I finally take time off from that place and you tell me to go back?"

"You're taking time off?" he asked as he followed her back into her room, drying his hair the whole time. "How long?"

"Just three days." Hezen opened her bedroom door. "I want to see if I can get over this little bug I have. Besides, every time you go to the doctor they find something wrong with you."

"Isn't that what doctors are there for?"

Hezen marched out of the room without saying another word. Had he said something to her? Worried that he had said something to offend her, he sprinted after and her still walking down the hallway.

"Didn't you become a doctor to help people?" He slowed his pace as he neared her to a slow walk.

Hezen stopped in her tracks. "No," she answered after a long pause. "I did it for a selfish reason."

Dante decided not to push it any further. He couldn't understand how or why something like becoming a doctor could be a selfish act because she was helping people every day. How could someone who did that be selfish? How could becoming a doctor be selfish? He just didn't understand.

The woman began walking once more but this time Dante waited a few moments before he followed. When he walked into the living room, he found her sitting down at the end of the couch, reading a book.

"How can you read after puking?" Dante asked.

"Reading helps me relax," she replied, not taking her eyes away from the book.

"Huh." Dante sat down on the couch and looked over towards an empty corner. "Why don't you have a TV?"

"I do."

"Where?"

"In the closet," she answered.

Dante blinked. "Why isn't it out here?"

Hezen closed her book and looked at the white haired man. "Look kid if you want it out here, go get it and hook it up, I really don't care right now."

"Kid?" Dante laughed. "Don't call me kid, you're not that much older then me."

She went back to her book with a sarcastic chuckle. "You're eighteen, I'm twenty-eight."

He twitched. "Really?"

"Yes."

Dante leaned back against the couch and placed his hands behind his head. "Ya know there's a lot I don't know about you but you seem to know a lot about me. Why don't you tell me something?"

She closed her book once more, this time with more of a slam. "I can tell you something I've noticed about you. It's something we both have in common."

"What?" He blinked and looked towards her with interest.

"Your mother gave you that amulet." Hezen pointed out as she closed her eyes.

Dante froze. The amulet was hanging down from his neck as it always because he had finally gotten the chance to fix it while being bored. His glance moved back over to the black haired girl in awe, how could she know something like that? Adrenaline released into his bloodstream, his inner devil hunter telling him that Hezen had gone through his things or that she had done something sneaky to get into his past.

"You hold on to it with passion and even shower with it," Hezen explained. "It's something you hide unless you're at home which shows that you're willing to protect it. It's obvious for someone who lives with you." She looked down at her left hand. "I have something that's important to me as well."

Dante stood, the feeling of adrenaline still flowing through him. "I'm gonna go get dressed."

"Fine."

As he walked away, the words Hezen said echoed through his mind endlessly. It was almost creepy that she was so aware of her environment in a way that he had never seen before. He knew she wasn't going to use it against him or anything of that nature but it was still a bit odd.

The box of clothes that allowed Dante to dress was still sitting where he had left it hours ago. He grabbed a worn pair of jeans and a white undershirt which fit loosely and slipped it on with his original pair of boxer briefs he had come in with. Now fully dressed, he walked back outside to see Hezen sitting in the computer chair with Pena on her lap and a book in her hands.

"Lemme ask you something," Dante said, moving his index finger back and forth. "How can becoming a doctor be selfish?"

Closing her book, Hezen sighed. "It's how I _became_ a doctor," she answered. "I don't have any other talent but studying and what, besides lawyer, involves so much studying and so much schooling? I became a doctor because I was afraid of what would happen if I took a job that had nothing to do with studying or schooling. It's not like I can draw, write, sing or cook or anything like that, all I can do is study and spend long hours looking at books. That's all."

The white haired man blinked, confused. "But you're a doctor, you help people everyday."

"Yes but how I got to be there was selfish. I was too scared to go out into the world and look at something else. Now," she sighed again this time the sigh laced with disappointment and resent, "I wish I had."

"Why?" Dante blinked.

Hezen lowered her head as her right hand came up and she studied it for a long moment. "When you become a doctor, you realize just how fragile human beings really are. Every time I go to work I'm stationed at the ER and see people come in that, sometimes, are in a million pieces. I have to put them back together for other people. But," she choked, "there are some I just can't fix. I _hate_ not being able to fix someone because I know how his or her loved ones are going to feel. I know more then anyone."

Dante stood, speechless. Was it wrong of him to let the room fall silent, or if it was the right thing to do? He had seen shows before about doctors losing patients but they seemed to get over it in order to move on with their lives but Hezen seemed like she couldn't get over it like everyone else had. What held her back so much?

Suddenly the older woman stood, and Pena jumped out of her lap. She walked towards the hallway but stopped at the entrance. "I know you've lost someone," she said as her hand touched the wall beside her. "I just wanted to let you know that I have as well. He's been gone for three months now. How long ago did you lose someone?"

Dante looked away from her and mindlessly fumbled with his amulet. "Eight years ago."

A laugh came from her. "I hope I can be like you…eight years from now."

Hezen took her hand away from the wall and walked down the hallway until she was back in her room. Dante heard her bedroom door close, and he sighed and fell back onto the couch once more.

"Hey!" Pena said with excitement in his voice. "You want to know the _really_ interesting thing about Hezen?"

"What?" Dante moved his arm over his eyes.

"She's talking about her husband, Evern, _right_?"

"I guess."

"You wanna know what happened to him?" Pena walked up Dante's chest until he was near his face. "You wanna know??" he asked with a teasing tone.

"Yes!" Dante hissed, not moving.

Pena giggled. "He was stabbed in the stomach shortly after becoming human. The real icing on the cake is who did it."

"Who?"

Pena walked over to Dante's ear, and moved his mouth down so that the white haired man would be able to hear him, and only him.

"_Vergil_," the cat whispered.

Everything stopped. For a third time in this apartment Dante felt himself froze, as if icebergs floated through his veins and chilled every inch of his body. Dante couldn't hear anything but the rain falling outside and his heart pounding away in his chest. He didn't know what to feel, what to say, or how to react and that ignorance led to the silence.

"Vergil stabbed Evern and left him to die in the rain," Pena continued to whisper. "The best part is that Hezen came to find Evern and found him on the floor dying. She picked him up, and held him until he died. Oh wait no, the best part is that she dragged his body to the hospital to care for him but he was already dead. Isn't it strange how everything is so connected?"

Dante jumped up and pulled a small pocketknife he always carried with him out of his pocket. Flipping it open, he pointed the end of it towards Pena as sweat began to pour down his face.

"Why the hell are you telling me this?" he asked harshly.

"Because," Pena jumped off of the couch and began to walk down the hallway, "I don't like you."

Dante watched as the cat walked down the hallway and opened the door by jumping up on the knob. The cat walked into Hezen's room and the door closed behind him, leaving Dante out in the living room to take in the shock.

* * *

R&R please! 


	5. Forgetful Tuesday

I don't own DMC, or any of it's characters, I only own Hezen, Pena, and Evern.

Here is the chapter that took me forever to do. Enjoy!!

* * *

Rain pounded against the window when Dante woke up once more. The ceiling stood above his head when he opened his eyes, and he could feel a pillow poking him in the back. Annoyed, he rolled over onto his right side and faced the back of the couch.

He only remembered bits and pieces of the night before but nothing stood out in his mind like Pena telling him about Vergil and what he had done. The thoughts of what might have happened ran through his head and he couldn't seem to figure out why his brother would kill someone he was working with. On top of everything, he thought it was too much of a coincidence that he was now here.

_Did she see him kill Evern? _Dante asked himself even though he knew he wouldn't get an answer. _If she did, what does she think when she looks at me?_ He sighed and closed his eyes. _Here I am cleaning up his mess again._

Pena jumped on the couch once more. "Hey! Did Hezen tell you she was leaving?"

"No." He sat up. "She's gone?"

"Yeah." Pena sighed. "I didn't hear her get up or anything and her car is still here."

Dante narrowed his eyes. "I know you hate me, but tell me something, has Hezen always been like this?"

"No." Pena shook his head. "Even I noticed the change in her personality. Right after Evern died she just shut down, she moved the TV and stopped listening to the radio and told Krain that she didn't want to be involved with the world. She stopped going out to do things and only went to work."

Hearing this reminded Dante of how he was after his mother was murdered only then he was so young. He remembered not wanting to do anything while he started living with another woman he referred to as his stepmother. Every day he would go to school but wouldn't talk or play and his grades were always low. It wasn't until middle school that he tried to act human and his grades picked up.

"I wonder…where she could be?" Pena looked down towards the floor.

"Look if she doesn't come home soon I'll go and look for her." Dante stood up and stretched his arms over his head.

"You'd better."

xXx

Three days had passed, and there had been no sign of Hezen. Dante had looked around town, and at the hospital she worked at but couldn't find anything. He had asked around, and one person told him that she had gone up to her parent's house for a few days so he came home, and waited.

Thinking that Enzo might have heard something, he visited him once only to find that Enzo was going bother him to work on another job. Dante managed to think of a lie in order to get off of work and Enzo, thinking that something was really important, let Dante be, and just handed the assignment to someone else.

It was strange, ever since Hezen had left the apartment, the silence Dante hated had returned. Even though Pena often talked to him because he had no one else to meow at, Dante felt somewhat lonely once more. Hezen was someone to talk to, and someone who did things for him that no one else had done and he missed that. He missed exchanging words with someone else, and just having her around.

In her missing he had gone shopping once more, buying Pena his litter, and cooking in her kitchen, always saving something for her in case she came back. He had set up the TV in the living room, hoping that when Hezen did come back, that it would start some kind of conversation with him. The TV also helped to keep back some of the annoying silence.

Now, though, Dante was driving around in the borrowed jeep and found himself at the hospital once more. He figured that he would check one more time, just for good luck. He parked the jeep in the guest parking lot, and walked into the main building.

For a hospital that treated mainly the poor community, the hospital was very well taken care of. People were sitting in the waiting room while they filled out paperwork, and nurses were wheeling around long-term patients. There was a small waterfall structure made with large brown rocks that caused Dante to relax.

Dante spotted the front desk nurse and walked over to her. "'Cuse me," he began, "is Doctor Hezen Major in?"

The nurse looked through a few papers, then back at Dante. "Yes sir she should be in the pharmacy. Please follow the signs and you'll arrive there."

"Thanks." Dante moved his hand.

As he walked down the halls, there were a few stares from his large red coat and almost bare chest but he just smiled at the people and walked on. Usually he wouldn't care what people around him thought, but here at a hospital where a friend of his worked he didn't want to cause issues for both her and himself. He figured they were lucky he didn't have his sword and twin guns with him.

_Pharmacy._ Dante thought to himself as he stopped at a corner with a map on it. A few arrows pointed down the hallway he was going down, while another, with the pharmacy title, pointed down a less traveled hallway.

_Guess that's it_.

He took the hallway and found that he was the only one walking down the large hallway. Ahead of him were large windows that showed a courtyard and told him that it was still raining. He looked at the walls and stopped when he found a large blanket on the wall covered in signatures of children the local doctors had helped. In the corner he found where the children Hezen had helped had written things.

_Thanks for fixing me!-Lindsey _

_Thank you so much Doctor Major!-Mariah_

_May God watch over you Doctor Major. Thank you for taking care of my daughter even though we have financial issues.-A thankful mother_

"Heh." Dante grinned as he looked at the writings and hand prints.

"_There are some I just can't fix."_

_Who were you talking about?_ Dante asked himself._ Look at everyone you've helped._

The sounds of footsteps caused Dante to pull himself away from the blanket on the wall. He looked down the hallway and saw Hezen standing there with a frown on her face. She was wearing a white doctor's jacket, a stethoscope around her neck, and a large picture ID on her chest. She stopped walking when Dante's eyes met hers, and lowered her head.

"So there you are my little escaping rabbit. I told you I'd find you," Dante said, quoting his favorite childhood book.

"Looks like you've found me," she said over the rain outside.

xXx

The two now sat in the hospital's cafeteria. It wasn't like Dante had imagined, it was large with glass windows all over the area and a covered dining area outside. There were all sorts of vending machines on the opposite side of the room, and Dante had already chosen a random soda while Hezen went off to get what she called real food and not something such as a cold piece of pizza or anything else that could come out of a vending machine.

After a few moments Hezen walked over to the table and set down four plates of food on white plates. Two held large hamburgers and the other two held a large amount of cooked fries. She sat down, and moved Dante his food as she took out a bottle of juice.

They sat there together, eating in silence as they listened the rain hit the windows next to them. Dante finished quickly and looked over to see Hezen eating more then he thought a woman usually ate. He blinked, and compared her eating amount to how much a man ate in his mind, and a smile to crossed his face.

"What?" Hezen asked, noticing his smile.

"Nothing," Dante's smile grew, "I've just never seen a girl eat so much."

Hezen moved her eyes to the side. "Yeah whatever, I have my reasons."

"You know," Dante took a quick drink of his soda, "I was worried."

He didn't know why he had just told her that but he felt as if he had to. As soon as he said it, he looked away from her, embarrassed that he had just admitted something he normally wouldn't.

"Sorry." Hezen turned her head completely away from him this time, and looked out of the windows. "You don't think less of me now do you?"

"For what?"

"Running away with my tail between my legs."

Dante blinked. "I don't think you did. What are you running away from?"

She shook her head. "Something I thought I was almost over."

The silence came back to them once more and now feeling uncomfortable, Dante joined Hezen in looked out towards the rain. Watching the rain after a few moments bored Dante so he looked away only to have his eyes fall on hers. The way she stared out into the rain just looked so upsetting, and as if there were things bothering her she didn't want to talk about.

"Kid?" she finally asked.

"What?" He perked up and got ready to listen.

She finally smiled and looked back towards him. "Never mind."

Dante twitched. What was her issue? "Alright."

Suddenly, the man Dante had met once and knew as Krain walked over to the table. He placed a clipboard down on the table and handed Hezen a light blue pen. "Here is the signing out paper you requested," Krain said with a smile.

"Thank you." Hezen grabbed the pen and quickly signed her name at the bottom of the paper, not losing her smile.

"You have an appointment this Friday alright?" Krain took back the pen and paper. "Nine A.M."

"Thanks again." Hezen nodded.

Krain took a look at Dante, and then walked away as quickly as he had come. The silence came back to the both of them until Dante gained the courage to ask a question that just now began to bother him.

"Why do you need an appointment?" He asked.

"It's nothing." She shook her head and finished eating. "I have something I want to say," she grabbed her pant legs in her fists, "I'm sorry I acted so strange the other night. If I touched something sensitive with you, I'm sorry."

"It's nothing." Dante leaned back into his chair. "It was just a question."

"Could you do me a favor then?"

"What?"

Hezen smiled once more. "Could you give me a ride home?"

Dante returned the smile. "Yeah."

xXx

Dante took Hezen down to her car after she had dropped off her doctor's jacket and ID in her station. They walked out to the car, and had begun their trip home when Dante felt it was time to ask a question he had. The question didn't reenter his head until he had found her, and once he discovered that everything between them was as normal as it usually was.

"Hezen?"

"What?" she answered, looking out of the passenger's side window.

"Do you know the name of the man who killed Evern?"

Dante waited for an answer but didn't get one. He figured that she would need a few moments either to think it over or just answer because it was such a sensitive subject but once he had arrived in the parking lot he twitched from not getting an answer.

He found a parking spot and parked the jeep. He shut the engine off, and looked over to Hezen who sat, looking out of her window. "Do you know what he looked like?" Dante asked, gripping the steering wheel.

Something else began bothering him. He hadn't thought about it before, but the thought of his brother doing something like killing another human being disturbed him. He had discovered a few months ago that Vergil was alive and well, but killing people was a whole other matter for Dante.

Hezen grabbed her door handle and opened the door without giving an answer. She closed the door and began to walk towards the apartment when Dante jumped out of the car and ran over to her. Remembering that he forgot to lock the jeep, he turned around and ran over to the car door, and locked it.

_Stupid lock._ Dante thought as he turned the key to lock it. _Why can't it have one of those click keys instead?_

Finished, Dante turned around to where Hezen had walked off to and ran to try and catch up with her. He ran through the lobby and up the stairs where he found her standing outside of her apartment with the keys in her hands.

"Hezen!" he called out. "Hezen!!"

She didn't react, and fearing being locked out caused Dante to bolt up the stairs. Hezen opened the door and walked in leaving the door open a bit, allowing Dante to slip in and he then closed the door behind himself so that no one else would be able to hear what they were going to discuss.

"Hezen answer me!" Dante hissed as he walked down the hallway. "I need to know if you know—"

Hezen fell against the right side of the hallway. "I'm pregnant," she interrupted.

"What?" Dante asked as his question left him for a moment.

"I'm pregnant," she repeated with a sarcastic slight laugh. "That's what was wrong with me those few days. This is great," she laughed another sarcastic laugh, "just great! How the hell am I supposed to do this? HOW!?"

"Hezen," Dante walked over to her and grabbed her shoulder, "what are you talking about? Look if you need help or something I'll stay as long as I can but—"

Her hand came up towards his face, and he reacted quickly by grabbing her wrist to prevent his face from getting hit, trying to be careful with her because of her pregnancy. He moved his left hand and grabbed her shoulders as she moved around and looked up at him. Tears were falling from her eyes.

"Hezen," he said in surprise as he watched the tears.

"Of course I remember what he looked like!" she yelled as she moved around in Dante's grip. "I was standing right there when he killed Evern! I stood there and watched as he stabbed him in the stomach!! I looked right into his disgusting ice blue eyes as he took his sword out of Evern dammit! I know it was Vergil your Goddammed twin!!"

"But then," Dante froze, "why did you take me in? I look exactly like him."

"I thought," she sniffled and looked down, "that if I saw a new light to the face I hated so much then I would finally be able to forgive myself."

"What have you done?"

"Evern was a human when he died." Hezen's breathing began to pick up as her crying became harder. "He wasn't a demon, he was exactly like everyone I treat at the hospital. I'm a doctor!! A medical professional who sees humans every Goddamned day he wasn't a demon anymore!! I couldn't help him the one person I wanted to save more then anything in the world!! I couldn't fix him!!" She looked up at Dante, tears flowing quicker then before. "I couldn't fix him."

"Hezen, there was nothing you could do," Dante said, saying the only default thing he knew to say.

"His wound wouldn't stop bleeding. I couldn't patch up the wound and he wouldn't stop closing his eyes," Hezen choked out. "I kept calling him back but he wouldn't stay! I don't even know when he died I was too busy trying to take him to the hospital! The place where I knew I could fix him but…he couldn't wait."

_How long as she been keeping all of this in?_ Dante thought as he listened to what she was saying.

"I can fix people every day, cure other's loved ones and let them live their lives healthy, even after tragedy has struck. Why couldn't that happen for me?" Hezen rested her head against Dante's collarbone. "It's not fair."

Dante moved his hands from constricting her, and hugged her as tight as he could, hoping it would make her feel a bit better. In reaction to his moves, Hezen wrapped her arms around his back and buried her face in his neck.

"He wanted to become mortal so we could be together," she whispered. "It's not fair."

xXx

Dante and Hezen, instead of standing, now lay down in bed, Hezen underneath the covers and turned away from Dante. Dante sat up, looking up towards the wall in front of him and thinking about what had just taken place. They had come into Hezen's room so that she could calm down and explain things to him. Her crying had stopped, and her eyes showed that they were now tried from the hard crying she had been doing, and small circles had formed underneath her eyes.

"I'm three months pregnant." Hezen finally spoke. "The baby is due sometime in November."

"Do you know what it is?" Dante asked, trying to lighten the mood as much as he could.

"No. I didn't want to know. My appetite has gone up from what it used to be, and I was throwing up because of this, I should have known sooner dammit."

"How could you not know for three months? Didn't you notice something was missing?" Dante asked.

Honestly, he didn't know that much about a woman's body during or before pregnancy but he did know that a woman didn't get her period when she was pregnant. Other then that, he had no idea what happened to a woman when she was with child.

"It's not unusual for a woman to get her period even though she's pregnant," Hezen explained. "It happens a lot to woman in their first pregnancy and I guess it happened to me."

"What made you think you were pregnant?"

"The throwing up, and my appetite changed so drastically." She rolled over more and pulled the covers up to her shoulders. "I don't know what I'm going to do with this child."

Dante blinked and looked down at her. "Why what's wrong?"

"Evern became a human just moments before he died which means the last time we were together…he was a demon." Hezen grabbed the blankets underneath her, trying not to cry. "This child is going to be half demon and half human."

That sentence struck a cord within Dante. He didn't want to think of what the child was going to go through as he grew up and all the bad memories of what happened to him suddenly flashed through his mind. He thought of his mother's death, his father, and then Vergil.

He felt her hand reach back and grab his. "Dante," she said, finally saying his name, "I'm going to need your help around here. I need you to stay here for a while longer."

"I was gonna anyway," Dante answered with a smile.

"I'm sorry if I said anything to offend you," Hezen said, gripping his fingers in her hand. "I'm sorry I blew up like that. It's just that I don't have anyone to talk to anymore."

"I thought you went up to see your parents." Dante blinked and looked down towards her. "Didn't you talk to them?"

Hezen sighed. "They're dead. I went up to their graves for a while."

"Oh."

She really didn't seem to have anyone else. Dante had never seen any friends, all he had seen was that Krain man she worked with, and other then him, Dante hadn't seen anyone else. No one had called for her while she was gone; in fact no one ever called period except for work related issues. She didn't seem to have any form of a social life.

"I'm sorry if this offends you but…I need help with this child. I need you to teach me how to raise a demon," Hezen said in a low, almost whispering tone. "I have no idea what to do."

Dante sighed. He didn't know if his mother ever had issues raising him and Vergil, or if because she was around demons and devils when she met Sparda and just knew how they were going to act but whatever it was, Hezen didn't have it. The issue was that he didn't know how to raise a demon. He was just raised the way he was raised, he didn't know how to apply it to a new child, and he lost his mother at ten; he was missing some important years.

"Hezen," Dante hung his head, "I don't know if—"

"Then just stay," she interrupted. "I just need you to stay for awhile."

Hezen began crying. She gripped Dante's hand with force, and tried burying her face into the pillow underneath her as she began to cry. Her hand left Dante's, and as he looked at her only to notice that her hands were shaking.

"Dante," she whimpered.

He moved his hand to her shoulder, and grip it, telling her that he was still there. Her emotions came over her, and she turned around, and wrapped her arms underneath his arms and placed her face in his neck.

"I'm scared," she said through her tears. "But no matter what I'm going to keep this child, I'm not going to give up."

Dante smiled, and wrapped his own arms around her. Strange, he hadn't been this close to anyone in years and in this moment he discovered just how much he had missed it. Having someone else's warmth against him felt nice, and the cold air around him seemed to disappear.

Through all of the warmth Dante closed his eyes and just stood there, holding Hezen. On the back of his eyelids he saw his mother and felt her warmth over his body, replacing Hezen's. When he opened his eyes once more he found that he had fallen into the bed with Hezen, with their arms still wrapped around one another, and Hezen sleeping heavily.

_She's so warm._ Dante thought as he closed his eyes once more.

Not wanting to get yelled at, Dante got up and left the warm room. As he stepped into the hallway a breeze of cold air hit him; he shivered. He walked over to the heating gauge and turned it up. The heating system banged together, telling him that it was working, and he walked over to the couch, and jumped on it.

_Sleeping out here…I won't get yelled at._ Dante closed his eyes.

* * *

R&R please! 


	6. Bringing Together

Wow, long time no update. Anyways, I hope everyone enjoys this chapter, I think it's really cute!

Enjoy!

* * *

The next time Dante opened his eyes, his nose picked up on a smell that felt familiar. He sniffed it again and discovered the smell of a home cooked meal that woke him up right away. He sat up and looked around to see Hezen sitting at the computer, and Pena sleeping at the end of the couch.

Dante stretched upwards. "What time is it?" he asked sleepily.

"Around eight," Hezen answered in a low tone as if she were concentrating on something else instead of what he was asking.

"Damn." He stood up and yawned.

Wondering what she was doing, he walked over to her and looked over her shoulder. He looked at the computer screen to see that she was doing something online at some kind of college website.

"What are you doing?" he finally asked.

"Looking to see if they have courses I want to take," she said, still giving all of her attention to the screen.

"Take?" Dante blinked. "Why do you wanna take more classes? You're a doctor!"

"I want to be a psychologist."

"Huh." Dante pulled away from her and tugged on her ponytail, pulling her face away from the screen. "You're going to hurt your eyes if you sit that close."

Following his advice, she pulled away from the screen and lifted her glasses, allowing her hands to rub her eyes. Once she was done, she yawned and moved her arms out to the side, and then brought them above her head.

"Damn I'm tired," she said, letting her arms fall back down. "I haven't even done anything yet."

He laughed a bit to humor her as he walked into the kitchen. He looked around and saw a plate of food waiting for him, along with dishes with more food. Taking his plate, he took a few more items and walked back over to the couch with a cup of juice in hand. Hezen looked at him for a moment, and then looked away with a sigh.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing." She shook her head. "I just wanted to say thank you for being here."

"Thank you?" He blinked. "Why?"

"Just because." She stood up. "You don't have to stay, but you are and I just wanted to say thank you for it."

"It's no big deal." He shrugged. "Oh, by the way, I might have a job to do tonight so I might not be in for a day or two."

"Alright." She smiled and nodded. "Just be careful as usual."

It was somewhat strange to see her smile so widely. She had smiled at him before, but not in such a calm, relaxed way before. Dante just smiled back at her, and then looked away, shaking his head.

"What?" she asked.

"Nothin'."

"Fine then." She began to walk down the hallway when she stopped and looked back towards him. "Remember what I said."

"Right, right." Dante nodded his head once more.

Hezen continued her walk down the hallway, and entered her room, closing the door behind herself. The moment the door closed, Pena raised his head up and yawned.

"She's finally gone," Pena said after his yawn. "'Bout time, now that I've started talking I don't wanna stop."

"Do me a favor and stop," Dante said, looking down towards the kitten.

"Oh shut up!" Pena hissed as he scratched. "I'll do whatever I want!"

"Fine."

Dante began eating once more while Pena jumped off of the couch and walked over to the spot near the kitchen where Hezen kept all of his food and his water dish. After drinking some water, he came back over to the couch and sat down next to the devil.

"So you're going on another mission?" Pena asked, trying to start a conversation.

"Yeah so?" Dante asked as he bit down on his fork.

"Just be weary of that Hilton hotel you were at the other day." Pena laid back down in a curled up ball. "I could smell the demons on you that day."

"I'll watch it don't worry." Dante rolled his eyes. "But you could smell demons?"

"Yeah." Pena closed his eyes. "It was a really strong smell. I can't go in Hezen's room because the clothes you wore that day are in there, waiting to be washed. It stinks too much in there."

"Whatever." Dante leaned against the couch.

xXx

An hour later and Dante had left Hezen's apartment, heading towards the bar Enzo frequented. He walked in with his coat trailing behind him and spotted Enzo sitting at the bar with a large drink in front of him.

"Hey," Dante said once he arrived next to him.

"Dante!" Enzo grinned. "How ya been?"

"Fine." He smiled back, happy to see someone else happy to see him. "You got any missions for me?"

"Yeah." Enzo reached down into his coat pocket and pulled out a piece of white paper. He unfolded it and read over it. "Back at the Hilton hotel there's been a lot of weird crap goin' on there. I told the security guy there that you'd check it out sometime soon just to ease his mind."

Dante raised his right eyebrow. "He just asked and you agreed?"

"Nah." Enzo laughed. "He asked for your protection for a few nights so I asked for a few hundred dollars." Enzo moved his index and middle fingers together.

"How many nights?" Dante moved his index finger at the bartender, telling him that he wanted his usual.

"Three." Enzo held up three fingers, proving his point. "While you're there, I'll see what other, better jobs I can get you."

"Alright." He shrugged. "I don't care as long as I'm getting paid."

The bartender brought over Dante's drink and left it in front of him. He picked up the glass and looked at the head of the beer sitting on the top when something came to his mind. "You know how to cook Enzo?" Dante asked, still looking at his drink.

"I know a few things." Enzo looked back towards his partner with a confused look. "Why?"

"Can you bring me by something? A recipe or something like that?"

"Sure."

"Good." Dante took a long drink from his beer, the ends of his mouth with a small smile starting to show.

xXx

That night at the Hilton hotel was one Dante couldn't make go fast enough. There wasn't a single sign of any kind of demon or devil around and he was bored as sin. The only thing that cracked a giggle in him was the occasional sound of a woman calling out in pleasure. He would walk by security guards who looked more worried then anything else but other then those few things, remained bored out of his mind.

After a boring night, Dante returned back to his office to check up on everything and make sure that no one had broken in to steal anything. He walked in to see a large amount of white letters on the floor he bent over to pick up, knowing what most of them were.

"Bills, bills, bills," Dante said as he looked through the pile. "Man, no one ever writes me anymore."

Once he had finished going through his bills, he walked up into his room and found an old tote bag in his closet. He opened it, and starting filling it with clothes that he liked, and anything else he could think of. As he walked down in the main office, he grabbed little knickknacks along the way, and underwear that he hadn't put away yet. Once he stood near his desk, and looked at the picture of his mother.

_Should I? _He asked himself. _Why shouldn't I? I don't think Hezen would mind but I'd feel bad if it just stayed in my bag._

He shook his head and placed the picture on the top of everything in his bag, and then zipped it up, trying to make sure that the glass on the frame wouldn't break. He looked around once more and found that he had everything he would need or want for the next six months and walked out of the front door.

xXx

When Dante walked back into the apartment, everything was still silent. He stepped in, and closed the door, being as gentle as he could in his attempt to not wake Hezen. As he took every gentle step, he walked into the living room, threw his bag on the couch and looked towards the kitchen to see Hezen standing in the dining room. The thing that caused him to twitch was the fact that she was standing there with a white towel wrapped around her body, and a towel holding her hair up, looking like she had just gotten out of the shower.

"Guess you weren't expecting me back so soon," he said with a grin crossing his face.

"No." She blushed a bit.

"Where you goin'?"

"One of my patients asked me to come in." Hezen went back to gathering her clothes from the table. "She really needs help and she's scared of doctors and I'm the only one she trusts so I have to go in."

"Huh." Dante blinked.

She came away from the table, allowing Dante to see that the black bra straps on her shoulders. She walked by him with a quickness in her step, passed him and into the hallway but as she walked away, Dante spotted something on her shoulder.

"Hey." He grabbed her on her left shoulder in a playful manner.

"What?" she asked, sounding annoyed.

He looked at the object on her shoulder to discover that it was a tattoo. He moved the bra strap in the way, allowing him to see the entire image. It was a humming bird with what looked like a female fairy sitting on it's back with it's one leg up and one leg down as if she were moving them up and down in a playful manner.

"A tattoo?" Dante pulled back on her bra strap and snapped it against her back. "I've never known a doctor with a tattoo before."

"It's old." She pulled away and began walking further down the hallway.

"She's happy."

Dante flopped down on the couch, waking Pena up. Pena then stretched and began scratching as Dante began to look through his tote bag.

"Ew!" Pena covered his nose. "You went to that hotel didn't you!?"

"Yeah."

"You stink! Wash your damn clothes!"

"I will later!" Dante pulled out an old pair of jeans and looked over them to make sure they didn't have any bad stains on it. After a clean check, he brought it to his nose and smelled it to make sure that it didn't smell as bad as the outfit he was currently wearing.

"Better," he said with a grin.

"Hurry up and change stinky!" Pena hissed out.

Dante stood up and began changing in the living room. Pena rolled his eyes and looked away while Dante took off his old pants and slipped on the jeans he had just taken out. Once he had his pants on, he threw his old, dirty pants into the hamper in the dining room with some of Hezen's dirty clothes.

Hezen came back into the room with jeans and a black dress shirt on. She came out looking for her wallet and walked by Dante who fell back onto the couch.

"How long have you had that tattoo?" He asked grabbing a soda he had left out earlier.

"Since I was sixteen," she answered as she looked around the room.

"Got anymore?"

"Two more." Hezen walked in front of Dante and began looking through

Dante blinked, not expecting that answer. "Where?"

Hezen found her wallet and placed it in her back pocket. "I've got one on my ankle and the other one is on my wrist."

"And I've never seen it?"

With a sigh, Hezen pulled back the sleeve on her right hand, and took off the watch sitting there and gave Dante her arm. He took it and studied the small blue humming bird sitting there.

"What's up with you and humming birds?" he asked, giving her arm back to her.

"I like them," she answered as she strapped her watch back onto her wrist.

"Why?"

"I just do," she said, sounded annoyed now. After hearing herself, she shook her head. "I'm sorry, I'm just stressed out right now."

Dante moved his right arm over the couch. "I understand."

"I haven't even eaten anything yet." Hezen moved her head backwards and rubbed her neck. "I have to eat that crappy hospital food. Oh well, I'm gonna go now alright? I'll see you soon."

"How long are you staying?"

She looked back towards him. "I have no idea. I'll call you and tell you and if you're not in, I'll leave a message alright?"

"Yeah." Dante nodded.

Hezen walked away from Dante and over to the front door. Dante could hear the door open, and then close without another word from the woman. After a few moments of silence, Dante laid down on the couch and grabbed the blanket there.

"Going to sleep already?" Pena asked, walking up the top of the couch.

"Yeah." Dante closed his eyes and slipped his boots off. "I've been up too long."

"Fine." Pena sighed and laid down as well. "Good night."

xXx

When Dante opened his eyes once more he looked over towards the time on the wall to see that it was nine in the evening. Figuring it was time for him to go and see Enzo, he got up off of the couch and stretched his arms upwards. He looked back towards Pena to see him still sleeping, and then looked over towards the kitchen where he saw a red light blinking on and off.

_A message?_

Dante walked over to the blinking light and found that it was the answering machine Hezen had been talking about. He walked over towards it and looked at for a moment until he found the 'play' button. Once found, he pressed it.

"_Dante_," It was Hezen's voice. "_Looks like I'm going to be in the hospital all night. We keep getting people that are injured from that weird new hotel. Shit, another one is coming in, I gotta go. Be safe._"

The message ended and Dante sighed. The clock kept telling him to go see Enzo and go back to the hotel but too many things were happening. He had to back to that hotel and stop whatever caused people to get hurt.

_I'll take care of this._

Dante grabbed his coat and all of his weapons while Pena watched him. He slipped his guns onto his hips when Pena finally got up and rubbed against his legs.

"What's that for?" Dante asked, looking down towards the kitten.

Pena rubbed against his other leg. "I'm rubbing my scent on you. Hopefully now the demons won't detect you if you run into any."

"But I need them to." Dante twitched.

Pena stopped. "Fine! I'm going back to sleep!"

Dante rolled his eyes and walked over towards the door. He made sure that the door would lock behind him, and then walked out without another word to the small cat.

xXx

Rain fell as Dante drove himself down to the bar. He pulled up behind the bar and walked into see Enzo sitting in his normal seat with two drinks in front of him. Dante walked over to him and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Got what I asked?" Dante said, causing Enzo to turn around.

"Yeah."

Enzo handed Dante a small piece of paper and a thin clip of money. Dante decided not to look over it and placed everything into his pocket. Once that was done, Enzo turned away from him and sighed.

"That hotel is a mess." Enzo shook his head. "There's no point in you even going over there, there are too many cops around and I can't have you get caught. Just go do somethin' else for tonight. Come back tomorrow night, hopefully things will have calmed down by then."

"Fine." Dante blew air up towards his forehead, moving his hair. "I'll be back later."

xXx

As Dante drove himself back to Hezen's apartment, he paused at a red light and looked at the recipe Enzo had given him. Once he read over it, he discovered what it was.

_Spaghetti? _Dante asked himself. _I guess that's what I'm going to be making. I think I've got everything._

xXx

Dante arrived back at Hezen's apartment and began looking through the kitchen to make sure he had everything. Hearing Dante move things around, Pena woke up and walked over to him.

"What are you doing?" Pena asked.

"I'm making something."

"What?"

"Spaghetti," Dante answered, still looking around.

Pena blinked. "Why?"

"Because I want to."

The ringing of the phone broke their conversation. Dante moved over towards the phone and picked it up after pressing the small button with the words 'talk' on it.

"Hello?" he asked while looking through the cabinets for pots.

"_Dante?_" Hezen asked. "_So you're finally awake? Listen, I'm just calling to tell you that I'm coming home in about a half an hour. They finally let me off._"

"Alright." Dante stopped moving and stood up. "I've got a surprise for you."

"_Really?_" Hezen asked with a girlish giggle. "_What?_"

Dante grinned. "I'm not tellin' until you get here."

She sighed. "_Alright then. I should be home soon. Thanks for making my day a little brighter._"

"What are you talking about?" Dante blinked and looked towards Pena who was eating.

"_Giving me a reason to come home again. It's nice. Look I gotta go now, I'll talk to you later alright?_"

"Right." A slight blush came across his face.

Without another word the line cut off, telling Dante that she had hung up. He turned his side of the line off and placed the phone back onto the dock while he returned to looking through the cabinets.

"What's the surprise?" Pena asked, coming back into the kitchen.

"I'm making her spaghetti," Dante answered with another blush.

"AW!" Pena squeaked. "How cute!!"

Dante rolled his eyes. "Get out of the kitchen, I need room to create."

xXx

A half an hour later Hezen walked into her apartment to smell something cooking, and Dante cussing in a loud tone. Wondering if something had gone wrong, she came around the corner and saw Dante standing in front of the stove with a large pile of dishes and red sauce on the counter tops.

"My God…" Hezen dropped her jacket on the floor.

Dante turned around to face her. "Hi! Surprise!"

Hezen blinked as she looked at Dante's face, seeing red sauce and some kind of powder covering his cheeks as it he had tired to wipe it off something else.

"I think I'm going to puke," she said as she walked away.

Dante followed her into her bathroom where she was splashing cold water onto her face. He blinked and moved over towards her once she was done washing off of her face.

"Sorry," she said with a deep breath. "It's the stress from the work and the baby."

"I understand. You still wanna eat?"

"Yeah." She looked back towards the white haired young man with a smile on her face. "I haven't eaten that much today."

"Come on then."

Dante held out his messy hand towards her. Hezen took it and was led back into the kitchen where he went through the pots and pans on the stove and finally gave her a plate with noodles and sauce.

"Thanks." She smiled. "This means a lot."

"Sure." He grinned back at her.

After Dante had given her the food, she retreated back to the couch where she sat down but remembered she had forgotten something to drink. She was about to get up once more when Dante held up a bottle of red wine.

"Uh…" Hezen blinked.

"Found it in the cabinet!" he said with a proud grin across his face. "I thought we could start it and I could finish it!"

"Dante…" Hezen giggled. "I can't drink…I'm pregnant."

Dante's face became blank. Embarrassed, he lowered the bottle and went back to making his own plate. A few moments later, he came over with two cups of juice and sat down in silence.

Suddenly Hezen began giggling. Dante looked over towards her and she began laughing loudly. Not being able to hold his own laughter back from her laughing, he began laughing as well even though he had no idea why he was laughing.

"You're such a dork!" she snorted out.

He stopped laughing. "Thanks."

"No, no." She slowly stopped laughing. "You're just so cute. Haha, I don't know. This is good by the way."

"Really?" Dante forked a large amount into his mouth only to find that it was good. "Wow you're right."

"Thank you," she said with a large smile. "I haven't eaten with anyone for a while now."

"You're welcome." Dante smiled back.

* * *

R&R please! 


	7. To The Heart

I haven't updated in so long ::bows:: I'm sorry. So many things have gone wrong in trying to write this chapter but I'm happy that it's finally done. Thanks for the reviews, I'm happy people like reading Dante taking care of a pregnant woman. What a laugh.

Enjoy!

* * *

The next night, Dante left to go back to the Hilton hotel in order to make sure everything was going well. A good mood ran through Dante from the day before because his cooking went so well, and from the fact that he had finally gotten Hezen to laugh out loud. Just the way she looked as she laughed forced a stupid smile to cross his own face and he thought about it as he walked into the hotel.

He walked into the hotel to find that it was dark, like the night he had come in before it had opened to the public. He walked over to the front desk and rang the yellow bell sitting on the desk.

"Hello?" he asked. "Anyone here at all? Or am I free to take a room?"

After a few more moments of nothing, not even a person walking by, Dante walked back into the open area gave a loud sigh. This place seemed to be empty from top to bottom; why the hell had Enzo asked him to come to a place like this when it hadn't even opened?

Just as Dante prepared himself to leave, a heavy, humid feeling filled the room. Dante looked around, grabbing the guns on his hips in case anything happened only to feel something slam him against his back. With the weight on his back, he few across the room and smacked into the wall there. The weight pressed Dante into the wall, cracking the cement underneath Dante's hands.

"Shit," he cursed as his face smashed against the wall.

A crack ran down from where Dante's body was, and up the wall. If they kept this up, the entire wall would soon collapse. But the wall falling wasn't the idea that bothered Dante, the idea of his cracking rib cage collapsing in bothered him. Dante groaned and turned his head around. There, against his back stood the beast who had attacked him before.

"You…again?" he managed to spit out. "I knew I should…have taken care of you."

Dante moved his right hand backwards and grabbed his sliver gun still hanging on his hip. He pushed the barrel into the monster's stomach, and pulled the trigger over and over. The force of the bullets gave enough momentum to push the monster back and allowed Dante to push himself away from the wall. He ran back to where he had been standing before the monster attacked him, picked up his black gun, and pointed it towards the monster as it turned around to him.

"There you little bastard," he hissed, somewhat out of breath. "I like where this is goin'."

His confidence began coming back, as strong as ever as the adrenaline inside of him began to rush to every corner of his body. A grin began to cross his face until he heard a loud scream come from above him. He looked up and saw more of the same type of monster that had attacked him crawling around on the roof, and a few on the different levels of the hotel.

"_Shit_." Dante began counting and added them all up and found twenty of the bastards in total. "One was bad enough…"

One of the monsters on the ceiling jumped down towards Dante, and the white haired man released an upward shower of bullets. The monster split to pieces and fell to the floor around him while Dante tried to get the demon's blood out of his mouth.

"Ew." He spit onto the floor and wiped the blood that had fallen onto him on his sleeve. "Nineteen more."

Dante ran forward, shooting every demon he could as he headed towards the front desk once more. The demons above him screamed once more, and jumped down to run after him. Reaching towards his back, Dante grabbed his sword and began swinging it around in all directions as he turned around towards the demons that then ran into his sword.

"Right into it," Dante mumbled to himself.

Once two demons had died from throwing themselves into the sword, Dante ran forward, stabbing it into demons that were coming towards him. His left hand grabbed one of his guns and began firing, taking out another round of the disgusting demons. With a few more swings and rounds of his bullets, all of the demons had fallen, leaving Dante alone.

"Dammit," Dante huffed.

This hot, humid environment made it hard for Dante to catch the breath he had used so quickly. Every breath he took in left him within a second and he couldn't take in a second breath. Every muscle inside of him started to spasm, and he fell to his knees, using his sword to hold himself up.

"What the hell?" Dante asked out loud as sweat began to pour down his forehead. "What's going on?"

While Dante tried to catch his breath, something began happening underneath Dante's feet that he failed to notice. The blood and small bits of the demons he had killed were moving towards the middle of the room. Bit by bit the parts gathered together, and made a new, more powerful monster.

The monster grew taller and changed to be black all over instead of the pink color it had been before. Its hands were long, sharp blades, but its face was still just two small slits indicating a nose. It was skinny and let out a low gargling noise that brought Dante to look up towards the new monster.

"Shit." Dante shook his head. "Another one?" He stood up, once again using his sword as a balance. "Welcome to the party."

The monster gargled once more while Dante moved into stance. He was about to get up and charge the monster when a sudden hard heartbeat stopped him in his tracks. A sharp, intense pain shot down his left arm that stiffed his arm and forced him to drop his gun.

"Ah!" Dante looked towards his left arm. "What the hell?"

His entire hand suddenly became stiff and felt as if it were asleep. With a grunt he moved his head back to face the monster, only to see it running towards him with its large, sharp arm out towards him.

"Dammit."

Dante jumped backwards, avoiding the sharp end of the monster's arm. The monster immediately stuck after Dante's dodge, and this time it managed to hit Dante across the nose. As Dante began to stumble from the hit, the monster turned around quickly, and stabbed its other arm into Dante's back.

Tired of taking all of the damage, Dante raised his sword and slashed the monster; the monster's arm ripped out of Dante as it flew backwards.

The two wounds Dante hurt so much. He had no idea why but the blood kept pouring out of the cuts and he found that the humid air around him made them hurt worse. His left arm still wasn't reacting to the messages his brain kept sending to it, which made Dante sweat a bit.

_Why hasn't it healed?_ Dante asked himself. _I'm not healing. Shit._

The monster came towards Dante once more, and in reaction Dante raised his sword once more but when his sword wouldn't come up, he looked towards his right arm. The pain that had plagued his left arm was now starting to run through his right arm, and as the pain grew, his sword fell from his hand.

_Now the other one!?_ Dante tried moving it but didn't get a response. _Now I'm screwed._

The monster moved closer and closer so Dante figured the best thing he could do was run but as he started to try, he found his legs wouldn't move. Adrenaline began pumping through his body as his heartbeat picked up, but none of it failed to help him get anywhere.

All he could do was stand there while the monster attacked him and began cutting him all over his body. The pain soon became overwhelming as he tried to move his hands and legs but got nothing in response. Cuts appeared all over his face, and on his neck while blood poured down onto the floor from the cuts that were on his face and allowing the humid air to attack the wounds.

_I can't do __anything_ Dante thought as darkness began to cloud his eyes. _What the hell is going on here!_

Suddenly the monster's right arm penetrated through Dante's stomach, and then through the left side of his upper chest. Its sharp end was so close to Dante's heart that it could feel the heart's beat pick up when the pain ran through Dante.

Without another second Dante's vision blurred and he fell to the ground. The pain was too overwhelming and the attack that was so close to his heart that it intensified the pain. The humid heat surrounding Dante was burning the wounds that already hurt so much and began to swirl all of his senses together until he could see nothing but darkness. He could no longer smell the stink of the demon attacking him, nor hear the monster slamming its claws into him over and over again.

_If I die here, I'll be so pissed._

All of the pain and humidity of the room soon overwhelmed Dante and the darkness that clouded his eyes soon seemed to take over his body. Before Dante could think or do anything else, everything suddenly became numb and Dante fell back onto the floor, unconscious.

xXx

Hezen looked up from the book she had been involved with for the past half an hour. She could feel something, a small tinge or like she had just forgotten something. She blinked, trying to figure out the feeling when she heard something against her front door.

_Is someone at the door?_ Hezen asked herself, looking towards a nearby clock. 6:34 AM. _Is it the kid? I gave him a key._

Worried, Hezen stood up and walked over to the front door. She stood on her tiptoes and looked through the peephole to see Dante standing there, covered in blood. Her heart began to pound in her body as she unlocked the door and opened it all the way.

There Dante stood with deep cuts and blood running down his entire body. His guns sat back on his hips, and his sword was on his back as usual and unnaturally clean but everything else was covered in dark blood. His outfit was torn all over in the places that weren't covered in blood. Through the torn areas of his clothing she could see were his wounds were but now they were nothing but small scars, meaning that they had healed in the time it took Dante to get back to the apartment.

"Dante," Hezen whispered.

Dante's eyes rolled to the back of his head, and he fell forward. Hezen gasped and caught him, falling back herself until she placed her right leg behind herself. She dragged him in a bit, and with all of her strength managed to get him on the living room floor. Pena jumped up from the couch and ran over towards Dante's body while Hezen ran over and closed and locked the front door.

_Great._ Pena thought, looking Dante over. _He did exactly what I told him __not__ to do. Do devils ever listen? _

Hezen came back but then ran into her room where she collected towels and a large amount of gauze and bandages. She ran back into the living room and fell near Dante's left side.

"Why isn't he healing?" Hezen asked out loud as her eyes traveled over his body.

Quickly getting into her doctor outlook, Hezen took off Dante's jacket, gloves, pants, and boots. She looked over his body and at all of his wounds when her eyes ran over a large cut in his stomach. This looked so familiar…

"_Hezen…" his voice wheezed. _

_Cold rain dripped down Hezen's back, staining her white doctor robes and gray shirt underneath. The wind blew, slightly moving her bangs towards the east as rain mixed with the tears rolling down her face. She watched as the man beneath her breathed his last, his last breaths even turning into a fight. A small puffs of air escaped his mouth, blood leaking from his cracked lips and his eyes losing their light. Blood from his torn open stomach pooled beneath the both of them, and lightened when it combined with the rain._

"_H-Hezen," the male choked._

_Evern. _Hezen thought, backing away from Dante's body.

"Meow!" Pena jumped up in front of Hezen and stood on Dante's chest.

Hezen shook her head, and patted the sides of her face with her hands, bringing herself back into reality. Her mind focused, and she placed her mindset in the same mindset she had whenever she worked with a patient.

"Thank you Pena," Hezen said as she began to work on Dante once more. "I needed that."

xXx

Thirty minutes later, Dante's body had been wrapped up tightly in white bandages except for his right arm. Hezen took in a deep sigh as she moved Dante's right arm into her lap and began wrapping it up from the elbow up to his fingertips.

_What did you do?_ Hezen asked herself. _Dammit kid, I'm going to let you have it when you wake up._

The wrapping of Dante's arm eventually led Hezen up to Dante's palm. As she began to wrap it up, she noticed a small gash on his palm that would require stitches. She looked over the gash and sighed.

_I don't have anything to stitch his hand up with but thread. That should be good enough to hold for now, just to stop the infection. I'll take him to the hospital when he wakes up to do a better job_ Hezen stood up.

She walked into her closet and pulled out the small sewing box she kept around the house. After gathering the needle and black thread, she walked into the bathroom and picked up a bottle of peroxide. She walked back into the living room with everything in her hands and fell down beside Dante's side once more.

_This is gonna be so gross!_ Pena thought as he looked away, covering his eyes with his paws. _I can't stand the sight of blood!! _

Hezen brought out the small needle she was going to use to sew Dante's palm back together and threaded it with a thin, black thread. She got ready to move the needle through Dante's skin, and as she poked through the first stitch, she jabbed herself with the end of the needle.

"Dammit," she hissed as she drew her hand back for a moment. "Stupid needle."

Forgetting about the pain in her hand, Hezen began to sew Dante's torn skin once more. After a few more stitches that brought his hand back together, Hezen was about to end the thread when her injured finger touched his blood.

A sudden, stinging feeling ran through Hezen's finger and through the rest of her body. She didn't know what the feeling was but she drew back because of it, and placed her finger in her mouth. Her stomach began hurting and she moved her arms down in front of her stomach to stop the pain.

_What was that?_ She groaned a bit from the pain. _The moment our blood touched…it hurt. Is it because he's a demon? Or is it because the child I'm carrying is the same type of species that he is?_ She shook her head. _It doesn't matter._

As the pain left, Hezen continued to sew Dante's hand, this time being more careful as to not mix their blood together.

xXx

"_Dante…Dante wake up again…please."_

_Mother? _Dante asked himself.

Dante opened his eyes hoping to see the ceiling of his childhood home only to see the ceiling of Hezen's apartment.

"Shit," Dante groaned as a wave of pain ran through him.

All of his unclosed wounds began to emit pain and he could feel every ounce of pain that could possibly run through him hit him at that moment. He looked down towards his body but stopped himself once he felt more pain just from bending to look down so he rested his head against his pillow once more.

"You're healing but you're healing slowly," Hezen's voice said.

Dante looked to the right of his bedside to see Hezen sitting down in a chair beside the side of the bed. A smile began to cross his face when he felt the sting of a wound near the side of his mouth.

"I've got a prescription for vicodin but you'll have to wait a few more minutes before it's ready to be picked up," Hezen explained with a gentle tone. "Once you have that in your system, the pain won't be so bad."

"Great," Dante said with a tired grin.

Hezen looked away with a small grin on her face and the more and more he looked at her face, the more and more he notice the bags under her eyes and how frazzled her hair looked.

_She hasn't been taking care of herself._ He closed his eyes for a long minute.

"Are you okay?" Hezen asked, as Dante opened his eyes once more to look at her as she spoke.

"Will be," he answered trouble-free as usual.

"What the hell did you do?" Hezen hissed.

"What?" Dante moved his head over towards Hezen's direction.

She was sitting there with her arms crossed and her legs folded over one another. Her eyes were closed tightly and her hands were gripping her clothing as if she were trying not to say or do something.

"What do you mean?" Dante asked.

"How the hell did you get so hurt?" she repeated with a harsher tone.

He moved his head back up to look at the ceiling. "On a mission."

"Don't ever do something like that again," she hissed. "You scared the Goddamned dog shit out of me."

"Sorry," Dante said as he looked at her in wonder. "I really scared you that much?"

She opened her eyes. "Yes! How the hell could I _not_ be scared? You're lucky I know the janitor here, he cleaned up the blood trail you left coming up the stairs."

It was strange for Dante to hear that someone worried about him or grew scared for him. He had gone on mission after mission and returned to an empty shop with no one to talk to him or ask how he was but now there was someone who worried about him all the time and was scared whenever he got hurt.

"I was going to take you to the hospital," Hezen said, taking Dante out of his thoughts, "but I couldn't carry you down the stairs like this."

"That's fine," Dante answered with a sigh. "I wouldn't want you to fall down the stairs and risk losin' the kid anyways."

"I had to put stitches in your right palm," Hezen said as she stood. "The stitches are pretty bad right now so when you're feeling better we'll have to go to the hospital."

"Fine." Dante closed his eyes.

"I'll be leaving in a few minutes to get your medicine so don't worry if you wake up and I'm not here." Hezen sighed.

Dante looked away from Hezen. "I don't care."

Hezen walked out of the room without saying anything else. She could sense something wrong with Dante but she didn't want to push him anymore then he was already pushing himself.

Pena jumped onto the bed after Hezen had finally left the apartment and walked up to Dante's face.

"I told you not to go there," the cat teased. "There's something there that doesn't like you."

"Shut up," Dante hissed.

"What's wrong?" Pena blinked. "Did something else other then your body get cut down today?"

"I said shut up," Dante hissed once more.

Dante's pride had been ripped apart. He felt so ashamed that he had lost a fight to such a simple demon _and_ managed to upset a woman at the same time. Dante hated the fact that he had gotten injured _and_ that someone else had to patch his wounds up. It felt as if he had lost his touch since being here with Hezen, and that was the fact that bothered him the most.

"Aw come on!" Pena rubbed his head against Dante's left arm. "Lighten up a bit! You're home now so don't worry about anything."

Dante looked back towards Pena and cocked an eyebrow. "Why are you being so nice?"

"Because." Pena continued to rub against Dante's arm. "I feel bad for you."

Dante pulled away from the cat. "I don't need your sympathy."

"Aw come on!" Pena sat down. "Fine if you're gonna be that way I'm gonna go and sleep at the end of the bed!"

"Go right ahead."

Pena stomped his small paws down until he reached the end of the bed. Dante could feel Pena lay down near his right foot and his tail fall on his foot. With a sigh Dante moved a bit and found a position that didn't hurt to be in. His eyelids soon grew heavy, and before he could start to think about anything, Dante fell into a deep sleep.

xXx

After a short trip to the pharmacy, Hezen returned home to find Dante and Pena asleep. With nothing else to do, Hezen began to do the laundry that Dante had stained with his blood.

_How often do I have to wash his damn clothes?_ Hezen thought.

She gathered a few items of clothing, hers and Dante's, and placed it all in a small blue basket with everything else she would need to get the laundry done. After a quick check through, Hezen walked out of her apartment and down to the third floor. She strolled by door after door until she came to a door with a set of stairs leading downwards.

The six steps downwards were ones that Hezen had counted over and over in her head for years. As she counted them, Hezen walked into a small, dim lit room with six washers in the middle of the room, back-to-back, and five dyers up against the right wall.

Hezen walked over to a specific washer, one she considered lucky, and opened it to find it empty. With a gratified sigh she began to place quarters in and started the water when Krain walked down the stairs.

"Hey Major," Krain said as he moved a large pink basket in his arms towards another washing machine. "I haven't seen you around here a lot lately, are you alright?"

"Fine," she answered.

Krain walked over to the washer behind Hezen's washer and began placing his clothing in while Hezen added the soap to her water. The room fell silent as the two took care of each of their own needs and when Hezen began checking through the pockets in the clothing, Krain began to speak once more.

"Ya know the Mayor of this city wants to meet you," he finally said.

Hezen looked back up towards her resident. "Why? I haven't done anything great."

"You've helped so many kids this year and everyone knows about you being pregnant so he wants to congratulate you in person," Krain explained. "He's been coming by and looking for you."

Hezen lowered her head. "I've been busy at home. I'll try to come in tomorrow; I've got a patient that I need to take care of."

"It'll be nice to have you there again." Krain looked up towards Hezen with a smile. "I've missed you."

"Thank you."

Hezen picked up Dante's black pants and began going through the pockets when her fingertips came against something smooth. She grabbed the object and pulled it out to find that it was the amulet Dante always wore.

"Does that belong to the guy who's livin' with you?" Krain asked.

Hezen placed it into her own pocket. "Yeah."

"Who is he? A friend? Boyfriend?"

"More like a nuisance," Hezen answered as she began to search through another pocket.

"So he _is_ a boyfriend!"

"No." Hezen shook her head. "He's just someone who's hanging around with me for a while."

Hezen found a few papers in Dante's opposite pocket and pulled them out. She looked over them quickly to find that Enzo's name written all over it but instead of reading the rest, Hezen stuffed them into her other pocket.

"When I go into work tonight, do you want me to call Mayor Saizin and tell him that you'll be there tomorrow?" Krain asked.

"Saizin?" Hezen looked up towards Krain. "What happened to Mayor Berdin?"

"He retired remember?" Krain cocked an eyebrow. "Saizin was elected a while ago. Wow bein' in that apartment without a TV's really caused you to zone out."

Hezen lowered the washing machine's door. "Yeah, death does that to you."

Krain knew in an instant that he had said something wrong. He looked up from his washing machine to say something else to her but Hezen had already picked up her stuff and had started to walk out of the room.

"Major wait!" Krain called as he began to run over towards her.

"Just stay there," Hezen said as she stopped walking. "It doesn't matter; just keep doing your laundry. I'll be there tomorrow so don't worry about anything. Goodbye Krain."

Hezen continued her decent up the stairs as she counted the remaining steps and told herself not to forgot how much time she had left on her washings. Krain stood there and watched as Hezen disappeared up the stairs as a feeling of dread suddenly filled him.

_What's going on with you Major?_ Krain asked himself. _There's something going on with that guy…something I don't like.

* * *

_

R&R please!


	8. Against the World

I haven't updated in awhile and finally finished this chapter. Things will finally start moving towards a new villain in the next chapter, so I don't know when I'll be able to update. Thank you for the reviews! Moving away from that...

Enjoy!

* * *

Dante woke to the sound of rain tapping against the window beside him. He blinked a few times until his vision became clear, and then looked over towards the large window to see the rain falling onto the window. It was strange, it had only stopped raining a few days ago and now it was raining once more.

_Where's the damn sun?_ Dante asked himself. _Summer's supposed to come in about two weeks so how about some damn sun already?!_

The bandages that Hezen had wrapped around Dante now felt loose because of his healed injuries. Feeling confident that he was back to normal, he sat up and managed to stretch his arms upwards. Everything felt healed, and Dante felt better then ever. The only thing that he found annoying was the stitches in his right palm.

"Hey Pena," Dante said, calling the small cat. "Are you awake?"

The cat stirred from his sleep. "What do _you_ want?"

"Is Hezen home?"

"I don't know if I should answer that question for you," Pena answered, stretching upwards as he answered. "You were such an asshole to me the night before and everything."

Dante rolled his eyes. "Come on tell me, it's important."

Pena moved his right paw towards the bathroom. Dante looked to see that the door was closed and the light was on inside. Dante got out of the large bed and stood on his own two legs but stumbled a bit when he felt how weak his legs were. "Damn," Dante mumbled as he wiggled both of his legs. "A few days off of these things and everything goes to hell."

"Psh." Pena rolled his eyes. "Whatever, hurry up and check on Hezen, I think she's throwing up again."

"What's your problem?"

Pena slipped himself underneath the covers. "Nothing."

No matter how much he would have liked to deny it, Pena had been worried about Dante. When he saw Dante have to be carried in my Hezen he felt a small bit of panic run through him and he _hated_ that he was getting attached to someone like _Dante_. The thought of even _liking_ the boy sent shivers down his spine.

"Fine," Dante spat.

The Demon Hunter walked over to the bathroom door and gently knocked on it. Without any kind of wait, Hezen opened the door with her tooth brush in her mouth.

"What?" she asked with a muffled voice.

"I just wanted to make sure you were alright," Dante said as he threw his hands into the air. "Don't bite my head off."

Hezen rolled her eyes and spit into the nearby sink. "How are you feeling?"

"Fine I guess." Dante shrugged. "Nothin' really hurts if that's what you mean."

"Good." Hezen crossed her arms. "I've got to get you to the hospital to get those stitches out."

"I figured that."

Hezen stepped out of the bathroom and walked into the living room while Dante followed. She walked towards the couch and pointed to the green bag sitting on the couch.

"I haven't touched anything in that bag so don't worry. I want you to wear something decent to the hospital, please," she said.

"Decent?" Dante cocked an eyebrow. "What you don't think my jacket is decent?"

She looked towards him and gave a small giggle that he had never heard before. He shrugged and picked up his bag. Hezen stood there as she watched him go through it and moved forward when she saw the picture frame.

"What's that?" she asked gently.

Dane paused. "Oh, it's a picture of my Mother."

She blinked. "Would you mind if I asked to look at it?"

He blinked, and swallowed hard. In the few weeks that he had spent with Hezen, she had never been curious enough to ask him about his past. He knew that she knew some things about him, thanks to Enzo and her past with Vergil, but other then that, she had never asked him about his family or his job. Were they growing closer?

"Here," Dante said as he passed her the small picture.

Hezen handled the picture carefully as she took it from Dante. She let her eyes roam over the picture, taking in every aspect of his mother's gentle and kind looks. Her eyes picked out small bits and pieces of Dante that she could find and figured that he gained the rest of his looks from his father.

"You have that gentle look in your eyes that your Mother has," Hezen said, handing the picture back to Dante.

"_I looked right into his disgusting ice blue eyes as he took his sword out of Evern dammit!"_

"But what about—"

"Your brother doesn't have that look," she said as she took a few steps away from Dante. "You're lucky."

Dante sighed. "Yeah I guess I am."

Dante placed the picture back into his duffel bag and began to seal it up. Hezen walked over to him and sat down on the couch beside him.

"Ya know you can put that picture up if you want to. I don't like the idea of you keeping it hidden away," she said as she set back on the couch. "Put it somewhere nice."

"Maybe." Dante looked back down towards the picture as a smile crossed his face.

"Just don't be shy about it." Hezen stood back up and walked into the kitchen. "Hurry up and get ready, I've got to leave soon."

"Fine."

Dante stood up and left his bag on the couch where it had been before after he grabbed a shirt and pair of pants. He walked into Hezen's room and changed into the black shirt and jeans he had picked out, and then walked over to the mirror near the bathroom to make sure that his hair looked alright. As he looked at himself in the mirror, he saw black bags hanging underneath his eyes.

_Where did those come from? _Dante asked himself as he leaned towards the mirror.

Figuring it was just because he hadn't been getting a good night's sleep, he stepped away from the mirror and grabbed a pair of socks from a box near Hezen's bed. He walked into the living room, grabbing his boots along the way, and sat down on the couch where he began to put his socks on.

Hezen was in the dining room, getting her jacket on when she saw a large lump in the pair of pants she had been wearing a few days ago. She walked over to the pants and took out Dante's amulet.

"Hey," she said as she walked over to him. "I found this in your pocket when I was doing the laundry."

"Oh." Dante took his amulet back and wrapped it around his neck. "Thanks, I was looking for this the other night before I feel asleep."

"Come on," Hezen said, moving her head towards the door. "Let's go and fix up your hand."

xXx

Hezen drove Dante down to the hospital. They entered through the emergency room entrance and walked over to the front desk. Hezen talked to the woman Dante had talked to when he was looking for Hezen a week or so ago. After the short talk, Hezen turned back towards Dante and led him back into the emergency room.

"Once your stitches are out you can go wherever you want," Hezen said as she walked forward.

"Sounds good to me," Dante answered.

They arrived at a large white door with a car slider on the right side. Hezen took the ID card the hung from her neck and slid it through the door, allowing them inside. On the other side of the door were lines of bed with people lying there and doctors tending to them.

"Keep up," Hezen said.

The two arrived at the last bed in the busy emergency room. She pointed towards the bed, telling him to sit down. He did as told and looked around as she moved about, collecting things that she would need in order to remove his stitches.

"Wow," he said as he moved around in the hospital bed. "This is great! I could get used to this! What did you tell that woman at the front desk anyways?"

Hezen pulled out a needle. "I told her that I found you walking out in front of my apartment building and felt bad for you. It was the only way I could get you in on such short notice."

Dante twitched. "It's better then nothin' I guess."

"Okay." Hezen grabbed the nearby rolling stool and moved it to over towards the bedside. "Hand please."

"Are you going to give me a shot?" Dante asked, looking at the needle with a cocked eyebrow.

"No, it's just to clean the area out," Hezen explained. "Just hold still and this will be over in a few minutes."

Dante moved his hand out and Hezen began to undo the wrappings she had done earlier. Once his stitches were out in the open, she cleaned the black thread off with the needle. Dante looked away, he didn't want to see her take the stitches out for some reason.

"Have you ever had stitches out before?" Hezen asked, trying to make conversation.

"Once."

"Where?"

"My leg when I was younger," Dante answered as his eyes focused on a man who was walking over towards them. "I was riding my bike when I fell and cut my leg open."

"I never learned how to ride a bike." Hezen moved in closer towards Dante's hand.

"You wanna learn?"

Hezen laughed a bit. "No thanks."

The man Dante had been watching was now looking back at him with one eyebrow cocked towards his hairline. There was something about the man that Dante didn't like but he couldn't put his finger on it. The man stood tall and very chubby with a business suit on. His black hair was slicked backwards, and his green eyes should out against his pale skin.

"Something wrong?" Hezen asked as she grabbed a small pair of scissors.

"No."

The man walked over to Dante's bed and coughed, trying to get Hezen's attention. Hezen, however, was very focused on the cutting she was doing and didn't pay any attention to the chubby man.

"Hezen," Dante said.

She looked up. "What?"

"Excuse me Dr. Major!" the chubby man said. "I've been waiting for you to come to work!"

"No please excuse me Saizin, I have a patient I'm working on. Could you possibly wait a few moments?" Hezen asked, not taking her eyes away from Dante's hand.

Saizin, the chubby man, twitched but laughed. "Dr. Major your reputation has lived up to you! I've heard rumors about you all around the hospital and I'm happy to hear that _those _are true."

Hezen sighed a bit. "I just hope you haven't listened to the ones going around town."

"Oh Dr. Major you know I can't talk to you about _that_ without a lawyer!" Saizin said with a laugh at the end.

"Lawyer?" Dante repeated.

"Never mind it," Hezen said to the white haired boy.

"I came here to congratulate you about your child!" Saizin said in a cheerful tone.

"Please," Hezen added with another twitch. "I'm with a patient right now."

Dante looked back down towards his hand to see the Hezen was almost done with removing his stitches. She was just so focused on what she was doing and Dante figured that it was that ability that Hezen had that made her a good doctor.

"Dr. Major," Krain said as he walked up to the group. "I was wondering if you were going to show up, I'm glad you did."

"Ah Dr. Krain!" Saizin said as he began to talk to the resident.

"Finally," Hezen whispered.

Dante laughed a bit from Hezen's remark. His eyes moved back towards his hand where Hezen had finally finished taking the stitches out of his hand and began cleaning the area up. Dante could finally see the long scar he had received that night from fighting the demon.

"Dammit," he whispered to himself.

Looking at the scar reminded him of how he had lost to the damn demon. He wasn't used to losing and it was something he _didn't_ want to get used to. This wasn't how it was supposed to be, Dante was supposed to win at things.

_Whatever._ He thought. _Doesn't matter now I'll go back and kick that demon's ass soon_.

"There," Hezen said, bringing Dante out of his thoughts. "You're done for now. Go do whatever you want now; you don't have to hang around here until I'm done with my shift."

Dante brought his hand up to his chest, and began rubbing his right palm with his left hand, trying to rid himself of the stiff feeling. He moved his fingers, wiggling them around until he could feel that they were now back to the way they once were.

"I think I'm gonna go get a drink," Dante announced with a smile. "You want me to bring you anything?"

Hezen shook her head. "I'm pregnant remember?"

Dante blinked. He hated feeling stupid. "Well do you want something like nachos from there or somethin'?"

Hezen thought it over for a moment, and then nodded. "Yeah, that would be nice. Just bring it home and leave it out for me alright?"

"Sure." Dante shrugged.

"Dr. Major!!" Saizin called with a loud laugh. "Come with me! We must discuss how we're going to celebrate your pregnancy!"

Hezen looked back towards Saizin, keeping her body faced towards Dante. Dante could tell that something was wrong, he didn't know what but _something_ was wrong. Saizin was a man that sent odd vibes to Dante, and the way the Mayor was talking struck Dante as strange. Why was Saizin so intent on talking to Hezen? Saizin acted as if he had something to lose or gain by talking to Hezen but either way sent red flags to go off in Dante's mind.

"I'm coming Saizin," Hezen answered.

"Finally!" Saizin chuckled.

Without saying another word to Dante, Hezen turned away from the white haired boy and walked over towards Saizin. Saizin began talking to her as they walked down the hallway of the Emergency Room, leaving Krain alone with Dante. Krain turned to Dante after a slight sigh.

"Do you need anything else?" Krain asked.

"Nah." Dante shook his head. "I'll be leaving now. Oh, by the way, when is Hezen's shift over tonight?"

"Nine AM," Krain answered his eyes still on Hezen. "I'll keep an eye on her for you."

"Thanks."

xXx

When Dante left the hospital, he found that it was still raining outside. He found a newspaper sitting on the corner to cover himself with, and walked down a few blocks until he reached his every day bar. He walked in the warm bar and shook off the small amount of water that had gotten onto him.

"It's warm in here!" Dante said in a playful tone.

"Dante!!" Enzo called from the bar. "Get your ass over here!"

Dante did as Enzo told him, and stepped over to the bar. He sat down in a barstool beside the fat man, and ordered himself a light drink. As the bartender began to mix liquids together, Dante looked towards Enzo to see a heavy blush across his face.

"Drunk as usual I see," Dante said with a laugh.

"It's Friday night what do you expect?" Enzo threw his hands in the air and laughed. "It's been a crazy week! Where have you been?"

Dante shook his head. "At that damn hotel. Somethin's goin' on there and I'm plannin' to find out what."

"Good luck!" Enzo shook his head back and forth. "I quit sending people there! Something stupid is goin' on there and I can't stand to lose anymore clients. Oh, by the way I found somethin' on that girl you've been stayin' with."

Enzo reached down into his right pocket and pulled out a small newspaper clipping that he set down on the bar. Dante snatched it and brought it up to his face to see a small picture of Hezen and her husband, Evern. Wondering what the hell was going on, Dante began to read the fine print.

_Doctor Hezen Major has been under observation for the recent murder of her husband, Evern Major. Until now Hezen was believed to be a survivor but now things are starting to turn around for the young doctor. It was found that Hezen had a benefit of fifty thousand dollars in life insurance money in the event of his death, and has since then gathered the money. Evern's body is currently in the process of being cremated under the request of Hezen, now that all of the tests on his body have been completed. Hezen is to appear in court on June twentieth to state her case._

"Shit." Dante placed the paper down on the bar and hung his head.

Dante had never thought of something like this happening. There was no way Hezen could tell the truth to the court and have them believe her, this was something that no one would understand who hadn't been in the world the two of them lived in. So many questions started to run through Dante's head that he wanted to ask Hezen but he couldn't think of what to do or what he should say to her.

"Dammit bar keep, give me an order of nachos alright?" Dante asked, looking back up towards the suited man. "And make it to go."

"You're leaving already?" Enzo asked.

Dante began to search through his pockets for his wallet. "Yeah, what time is it?"

Enzo looked up towards the TV to see a clock. "Almost midnight."

"Do you have a mission for me or anything tonight Enzo?" Dante asked as he pulled out his wallet.

The fat man shook his head back and forth. "Nothin' tonight Dante. I might have something for you to do _tomorrow_ night if a certain someone comes through for me."

"Fine, I'll be back tomorrow night then."

The bartender placed a white paper bag in front of Dante with a greasy bottom. Dante placed five dollars down on the bar, grabbed the bag, and walked out of the bar towards the hospital.

xXx

When Dante arrived at the hospital, he walked into the cafeteria and took a seat next to one of the large windows. He ordered a small plate of food and a drink, and found himself staring outside into the rain.

Water dripped off of him from walking through the rain in order to get to the hospital but Dante didn't care. There was too much on his mind right now to care what was wrong on his outside. How was Hezen supposed to get through something like going to court to testify about what happened to her husband when it happened in a world that he belonged in? No normal court would ever believe the truth, and Dante wanted to know what Hezen was going to tell the court instead.

_I'm getting too attached._ Dante thought as he moved his head back. _Why am I worried about this?_

Why _was_ he worried? Had he really grown that attached to her now? Dante had no idea why he had grown so attached to Hezen but whatever had caused them to grow so close was what was keeping them so close together. And whatever that thing was, Dante promised himself to keep it going, and to make sure that it wouldn't dissolve.

Dante really couldn't think of the last few people he had been this close with. This close feeling he had with Hezen was something that he had never had with anyone else, but he knew what this feeling wasn't. The feeling inside of him wasn't love or friendship, it felt different from those feelings he had felt before but he couldn't think of words to describe it. This whole thing _bothered_ Dante, he wanted to know _now_ what this relationship was that they had but as he thought over it, his eyes spotted another newspaper sitting in the corner of the room.

He stood up from the small chair he was sitting in and walked over to the newspaper. He grabbed it and returned to his seat without any other problems. As he began to open it, he found another article about Hezen.

_Should I even read this?_ Dante asked himself. _Screw it._

Dante flipped passed the article on Hezen and landed on the sports page. With a smile crossing his face, Dante began to read over the sports that he had been missing out on during his time out.

* * *

R&R please! 


	9. From Me to You

Thank you all for the reviews! I didn't think anyone was reading this story anymore! Thank you!

Alright this story is going to start picking up now. I feel that the introduction of Hezen, Pena, and Dante are almost done, so now things can move along with the villain and the main part of this story; Dante learning to deal with his human/demon side in a strange way. This is going well.

Enjoy!

* * *

In the nine hours of waiting for Hezen to get off of her shift, Dante had fallen asleep in the cafeteria. His arms were folded on the top of the table, and his head was resting on his crossed arms to create a pillow. As he slept away with the sound of rain behind him, Hezen walked over to his side and gently shook him.

"Hey Dante," she said. "It's time Dante."

Dante's eyes flickered open to see Hezen standing beside him with a usual large smile across her face. He sat up with a yawn and stretched his arms out over his head that came with a small crack.

"Have you been waiting here this whole time?" Hezen asked. "You could have left ya know."

"Yeah I know but…" Dante paused as another yawn came. "I just felt like comin' back here."

"Well come on then, my shift's over now." Hezen moved her head towards the hallway that led out of the hospital.

Dante perked. "I got your," he looked towards the bag of nachos to see that the grease had seeped through onto the table, "well…I _had_ your nachos."

Hezen moved her right hand towards the exit. "Come on, I want to get home before I even look at food."

"Whatever." Dante shrugged.

xXx

Dante and Hezen walked out of the hospital and into the dark parking lot where Hezen had parked the car earlier. They passed street lights in silence as Hezen searched through her pockets for her keys. After a walk of nothing but silence, the two found themselves standing in front of the car.

"Gonna open it?" Dante asked as he looked at Hezen.

"I'm looking for the keys!" she hissed. Her fingers moved around in her pockets but she couldn't find the keys. "Dammit, don't tell me I left them in the hospital. What the hell is wrong with me?"

"You want me to go back inside?" Dante turned his body back towards the hospital.

Hezen shook her head. "I'll go. It's my fault."

Dante sighed. "Let _me_ go."

"You want to leave me out here in this dark parking lot?" Hezen snapped as she threw a glare Dante's way.

"Oh but _you_ want _me_ to stay out here all by myself?" Dante said with a sarcastic grin.

Hezen twitched. She wasn't expecting that. "Fine," she turned towards the hospital, "let's hurry up. I'm hungry."

"I've got nachos!" Dante held up the wet brown bag.

"You're such a smart ass." Hezen rolled her eyes.

Together, Dante and Hezen began walking back to the hospital doors. It fell silent between them once more; Dante was too busy looking around the area to start or carry on a conversation with Hezen at the moment. Just a few feet in front of the hospital doors, a street light above the two flickered on, then off. Hezen stopped walking underneath the flickering light and looked up at it.

"Five B again?" she whispered. "I'll have to tell management."

Dante stopped in his tracks and turned back towards Hezen. "Hurry up! I'm hungry too ya know!"

Hezen looked away from the light and towards Dante. "Fine. I was just doing my damn job."

_She's just like that damn cat sometimes._ Dante thought with a shake of his head. _I guess that's where he gets his attitude._

A humid atmosphere flooded the parking lot. The same humid, groggy atmosphere Dante had felt in the Hilton hotel. Dante fell to his knees as a strange, hard pressure came down onto his chest. The air became hard to breathe; something that Dante's body didn't need at the present moment. Hezen ran over to Dante's side, and began shaking his shoulder as she shouted his name but her cries fell onto deaf ears. Once again Dante's body became engulfed in a sharp, deep pain on his arms and legs that seemed to come from nowhere.

"Dante!" Hezen screamed once more. "What the hell is going on!?"

"S-shit," Dante managed to say as he fell forward onto his hands.

The plain, dark parking lot around the two changed into a solid red color. Every building, corner, and street light changed to a red color that intensified the humid air. Sweat began to fall from both Dante and Hezen while Hezen's breathing picked up as well.

"Dante," Hezen asked once more. "What's going on?"

"You gotta get outta here," Dante said through his panting. "It…ain't safe for you here."

"Safe?" Hezen repeated.

"GO!"

Hezen took a step back away from Dante, and then another. She wanted to run away just as Dante had told her to but she couldn't leave him here like this. She shook her head and walked back over to his side.

"Dammit kid," she hissed.

Dante pushed down on his knees and wrists until he managed to stand. He stumbled to his right a bit, but caught himself before he could fall over. Hezen push Dante over to his left side and helped balance himself out.

"I told you…to go!" he hissed.

"And where the hell am I suppo—"

Three large beams fell from the sky, and embedded themselves into the ground vertically. Dante turned around and looked at each of the strange, beams that appeared to be beams from a construction site. A light red barrier formed between the beams and trapped them in a triangle the beams made.

"Great." Dante straightened his back. "Now what?"

"I've been waiting for you, Son of Sparda," a deep, male, demonic voice said.

A figure dropped from the sky and stood in front of Dante and Hezen. The figure had a human look to it, a male with greasy green hair and black eyes that hid his pupils. He wore a large black trench coat that hid everything from sight. Dante looked up at the strange man and guessed his age to be the same as his, eighteen.

"And just who do you think you are?" Dante asked with a grin.

"A hunter," the man hissed. "I've been trying to track you down Son of Sparda. You've got a bit of a warrant on your head back in Hell."

Dante took a small step forward. "I have a name."

The man drew out a large sword from his back. "I don't care. I'm here to weaken you for my master."

"Master?" Dante laughed. "So your master doesn't have the balls to come after me himself?"

"I'm not here to talk. I've got a mission to complete." The strange man moved the tip of his sword towards Dante and bent his knees.

"Hezen," Dante said as he stumbled back towards her. "You've got to get back and avoid this fight."

Hezen pushed herself against Dante. She shoved her body against his until he stood on both feet once more. Once he was standing normally, Hezen stepped behind him and bent her knees in case she had to run.

"How are you going to fight?" she asked. "You can't even stand up in this environment."

"Oh Dr. Major!" the strange man said as his eyes landed on her. "I didn't even see you there. I'll have to find something to do with you."

As the strange man spoke, Dante moved down to his boots and slipped out Ebony, the only gun he had brought with him. He aimed it out towards the man when the man raised his left hand up towards Dante.

The pain Dante had been feeling suddenly disappeared, he felt fine. Perfectly fine to be exact. His vision narrowed onto the strange man ahead of him, and a grin crossed his face. Now that Dante was back to his normal self, this man didn't stand a chance.

"Come on!" Dante teased. "Let's start thi—"

Another pain came over Dante but this pain, this pain _changed_ Dante. His eyes changed from a pale blue color to a black color with red pupils and his fingernails grew out until they resembled claws. The skin on his arms began to crack, and red mist seeped out from the cracks. This feeling was wonderful. Dante felt like he could jump up and touch the moon and drag it down with him.

"Dante?" Hezen asked.

"We'll be outta here in a minute!" Dante said with a cocky grin. "Don't worry 'bout nothin'!"

Dante didn't know what the hell was going on but whatever it was, it was great. This kind of power Dante needed, the kind of power Dante _needed_. The grin he wore on his face showed that his canine teeth were growing out a bit more then the rest while the rest of his teeth sharpened.

Just as Dante began to enjoy the power surging within him, a strong pain hit him whenever his heart pounded away inside of his chest. The harder and harder his heart slammed inside of his ribcage, the more intense the pain grew. Dante fell down to his knees once more. Seeing Dante fall, Hezen ran over to his side and grabbed his left shoulder.

"Dante!" she called. "Dante are you alright?"

"Don't!" Dante growled.

"But—"

Dante moved his left arm out and pushed Hezen away. She stumbled backwards and fell down onto her backside with a grunt. She started to stand back up when the ground underneath her began to shake and forced her back down to the ground.

"Excuse us Dr. Major!" the strange man said. "There's something inside Dante that I need."

"Inside Dante?" Hezen asked.

"W-What the hell?" Dante said with strain behind his voice. He moved his head up to the stranger as sweat trickled down his face. "What are you talking about?"

Two large gray angel statues came out of the shaking ground near Hezen. The statues reached out and grabbed Hezen's arms so she couldn't interfere. She struggled against the angels that held her back but couldn't get away from them.

"Dante!" Hezen called. "Dante!!"

But Dante couldn't hear Hezen calling his name over the pain running through him. He couldn't hear anything but his heart beat slamming away. The strange man walked over to Dante, his boots clomping against the cement. He stood in front of Dante with a grin on his face and moved the end of his sword underneath Dante's chin.

"What's your name?" the stranger asked.

Dante could hear him. "W-What?" he said through gritting his teeth.

"Your name!" the stranger repeated. "Give me your name."

Dante grabbed the sword with his left hand and gripped it until blood leaked from his fingers. Dante managed to pull the sword forward enough to grab the stranger's wrist. The stranger struggled a bit, but then allowed Dante to pull him forward.

"What are you doing to me?" Dante huffed.

"Taking what you don't deserve," the stranger answered.

The strange man pulled his wrist backwards, and pulled Dante's arm along with him. As Dante moved forward, the man's sword tore through the center of Dante's chest until it emerged out of Dante's back. The man drew his sword out of Dante's body but instead of falling to the ground, Dante moved onto his knees and sat up.

"Dante!" Hezen called out.

She couldn't take watching this. Every time she blinked the image of Dante changed back to what Evern looked like the night had had been killed. Her heart slammed away in her chest as fear and adrenaline pumped through her body. Tears began to stream down her face when an attack of nausea came over her. Her body flared as a high fever came over her body and her mouth dried. Her stomach began to cramp and in one hard cramp; Hezen bent forward and threw up.

"Dante," she whimpered once her mouth was clear. "_Dante_."

Strange, Dante couldn't feel any pain. He felt _fine_. There was no pain emitting from the wound in his chest even though blood was falling from it. His breathing had been labored; his trachea had been sliced on the left side and he was now using his right lung to breathe.

The stranger laughed. "Come on out!" he said with a grin crossing his face.

A bright white light floated from the hole in Dante's chest and towards the stranger. Dante's eyes watched the white ball float into the air and float over to the hunter. The ball danced in a small circle in front of the strange man, and dodged the man's hand every time he reached out to grab it.

"Hold still," the man whispered.

"Dante!" Hezen screamed. "Get up already! Dante!!"

The white light stopped dancing. It paused at the sound of Hezen's voice; the stranger took the opportunity and grabbed the white ball in his closed fist. The white ball, however, had heard its name be called and wasn't going to stay with the hunter. The ball pushed its way out of the hunter's hands through the gaps in his fingers, and floated over towards Hezen.

"What!?" the stranger yelled.

The stranger ran towards the white light as it moved to Hezen but before he could reach it, the light slipped into Hezen's open mouth. She glared up at the stranger and closed her mouth tightly. The white light in her mouth felt soft but Hezen could also feel a small hard middle dancing on her tongue.

"Don't," he warned.

She swallowed the white ball and opened her mouth to catch her breath after. For some reason, Hezen knew that she had to keep the white ball to herself. She couldn't let anyone else have it, no matter the cost.

The ball slipped down her trachea easily, and traveled quickly down to her stomach where it exploded. Dante suddenly fell forward onto his face in a pool of blood that had gathered from the hole in his chest. Hezen began tugging at her arms, trying to free them from the statues that held her back from Dante.

"Dante!" she called once more. "Get _up_!"

"Dammit!" the stranger hissed.

Dante's eyes fluttered open. The wound in his chest started to heal normally as he pushed himself up onto his knees and grabbed Ebony from the floor. He turned around, stumbling a bit, and pointed the gun towards the stranger. The red world around the three didn't affect Dante anymore, for a reason he didn't understand and didn't much care to understand at the current moment.

"Now," Dante panted, "what were you talking about before? Something about your master?"

The stranger turned around to Dante. "Shit," he muttered. "Don't worry; I finished half of my job here!"

The stranger snapped his fingers once and the right angel that held Hezen's upper right arm gripped down until her bone snapped. She screamed out in pain and fainted from everything her body had been through. Dante began firing Ebony over and over again at the stranger but it was too late, the stranger was slowly disappearing, along with the rest of the humid environment.

"Dammit! Hold still!" Dante ordered.

"I'll be back, Son of Sparda!" the stranger yelled.

The heat around Dante and Hezen disappeared, and Hezen fell from the two statues that had been holding her up. Dante slipped Ebony back into his boot once the safety was on, and ran over to Hezen. He turned her back over, and held her against his chest.

"Hey!" he said as he shook her. "Hey! Hezen, come on wake up!"

The parking lot returned to normal, and a cold breeze blew over the two. Dante shook Hezen over and over again but he didn't get a response from her. He moved her broken arm over her chest, and stood with her body against him.

"Damn you're heavy," he whispered.

Dante's body shifted back to a normal human body without the pain he had experienced before. With his body back to normal, Dante turned back to the hospital they had just come from, and ran towards the Emergency Room.

xXx

"What!?" Pena yelled. "Hezen's in the hospital!?"

Dante had returned home to Hezen's apartment, without her. He was now sitting down on the couch in Hezen's apartment as Pena paced back and forth on the back of the couch. Dante kicked his boots off and placed his feet on the arm rest of the couch, something Hezen told him _not_ to do.

The doctors insisted that Hezen stay so that they could keep an eye out on her baby, and her broken arm. Hezen had been inactive in the hospital for three days but that didn't seem to worry Dante or Pena. In fact Pena didn't react at the story Dante told him about the indent in the parking lot until Dante began talking about how a strange white light had escaped from his chest.

"Yeah." Dante sighed. "She's been asleep for three days straight."

"Oh God!" Pena fell flat on his back and onto Dante's legs. "What if something happens to her?! What will happen to me?!"

Dante rolled his eyes. "Relax, nothing's gonna happen! She's fine now!"

Pena sat up. "You don't get it do you demon boy? Do you understand what's happened to you?!"

"No," Dante answered carelessly as he moved his arms behind his head. "I went out, looked for the ass that injured us, did a few missions along the way, made some money, and came back here. Everything's fine."

Pena stomped up to Dante's chest and looked him square in the eye. "You've entered a contract!"

"Contract?" Dante blinked. "What are you talking about?"

"You _don't know anything_!!" Pena hissed with a growl behind his voice. "When powerful demons come into the real world they need to make a contract with someone or something that gives them a name! When Sparda came into the human world humans gave him the name Sparda and allowed him to live in the real world with Eva."

Once again Dante rolled his eyes. He hated hearing his parent's history. "Tell me something I don't know."

Pena narrowed his eyes. "When you and Vergil were born your mother gave you names not only names for your human side, but for _your demon_ side. That strange man you were fighting called out your human side, leaving you pure demon for once and without a real name. Without a name you lose all of your demon powers so what happened?"

Dante thought for a moment. All he remembered from the fight was falling face forward with the white ball had come out of his chest, but resurrected for some reason a few minutes later. The more he thought about, the more came back to him.

"_Dante!! Get up already! Dante!!"_

Hezen had called his name out after she had swallowed the light, his human side. Whether Hezen knew it or not, she had renamed him when he had reverted back to his pure demon side.

"Hezen," Dante muttered. "She called my name."

"Dante?" Pena asked.

Dante nodded his head as he thought it over for a moment.

"So she renamed you," Pena said with a sigh. "Good thing it's the same name you already know," he sighed once more, "moving away from that we have a lot more to worry about."

"Like what?" Dante asked as he cocked an eyebrow.

"Hezen's harboring your human side right now, and if she dies, your human side dies along with her," Pena explained.

"What!?" Dante sat up and sent Pena rolling down his chest. "How the hell did that happen?"

Pena rolled down Dante's chest and to the end of the couch. He sat back up and crossed his arms. "Like I said, that strange guy took your human side away and Hezen had to rename you entering you into a contract to allow you to live in the human world with your demon side. Hezen has your human side now and until you find a balance between your demon and human side, Hezen keep your human side."

"Shit." Dante shook his head.

What a pain in the ass this was turning out to be. Dante didn't know _anything_ about what was going on around him; he had no idea about demons coming to Earth and having to be named. All he did was kill demons and devils; he didn't ask them their names or care how they got to Earth. Normally Dante would blow this whole situation over but now his life and Hezen's life were on the line.

"So what do I have to do to get my human side back?" Dante asked with a sigh.

"How many times to I have to repeat myself?!" Pena yelled. "You need to find the balance between your human and demon side. I think you're lucky Hezen has your human side! Her body has the capability to nurture human life right now so your human side will grow faster in her body."

"Whatever." Dante rolled over to face the back of the couch. "I'll deal with this tomorrow."

"Tomorrow!?" Pena slammed his paws onto Dante's legs over and over again. "What the hell do you mean 'tomorrow'? You have to deal with this now!"

"I have to wait for Hezen to wake up don't I?" Dante closed his eyes.

Pena paused. "Well…yeah. I guess we do."

"Good night then," Dante said with a small sigh.

Pena watched as Dante relaxed into the couch and fell asleep. It annoyed the feline that Dante was being so casual about the whole situation when it was in fact a big deal. The more Pena thought about it, the more it pissed him off so Pena rolled into a small ball near Dante's feet, and fell asleep as well.

* * *

R&R please! 


	10. Volition

Thank you for all of the reviews! Shout outs go to:** Amelia**, **sion0083,** **lunatic Pandora1,** **Katalina Matthews**, **Demerah**, and** Lexraheart**. Thank you for reviewing this story!

Moving away from that, here's chapter ten and hopefully the end's a surprise for everyone.

Enjoy!

* * *

"Dante, Dante wake up for me."

Dante opened his blue eyes. There in front of him was his mother, Eva, with a gentle smile on her face. Dante blinked a few times as she began to pet his hair and move it away from his face. The gentle feeling of her fingers against his forehead overwhelmed Dante enough to close his eyes and drop his guard.

"So there you are Dante," Eva said. "I've been waiting for you to wake up for awhile now."

"Mother?" Dante asked softly.

"You've lost something Dante," Eva began. "You've lost the gift I gave you at birth."

Dante opened his eyes once more and looked up at his mother. "What?"

"Your name…and your humanity," she finished.

"_Dante!! Get up already! Dante!!"_

Hezen's voice ran through Dante's head, and reminded him of what he had lost. With a heavy sigh, Dante closed his eyes once more. He could still feel his mother's touches but suddenly, her touches stopped. He tired to open his eyes once more to see her but he couldn't open his eyes. Over and over again he tired to open his eyes but he just couldn't get them to open. Panic began to run through his body but it wasn't helping.

"Goddammit!" Dante yelled.

xXx

"Dammit!" Dante woke with a startle. He began panting to catch the breath he had lost in his wake and as he looked around, he found that he was lying down in a hospital room.

His eyes fluttered as he looked around the room, and found Hezen lying down in the bed. She was in a hospital gown with a sling holding her right arm over her stomach. After Pena's nagging, Dante had spent one night at the hospital with Hezen. He waited for her to wake up just so he could tell her what happened.

He looked down at his crossed arms, and placed his head back down on top of them. The overwhelming feeling of drowsiness took Dante, and he began to close his eyes to fall back to sleep when Hezen stirred.

"Uh," she groaned. "What the…hell?"

Dante's eyes opened once more. "You alright?"

"No!" she hissed. "What the hell happened?"

"You don't remember?"

Hezen blinked. The memory of what happened days earlier came back to her all at once. All of the pain she had gone through hit her as a small wave of pain ran through her broken arm. But as she searched her memories, a warm, gentle feeling began in her stomach and worked its way through her body. She moved her good arm to her stomach and bent forward.

"What's inside of me?" she whispered.

"A baby."

Hezen shot Dante a glare. Dante grinned back at her with his usual, sarcastic look. Hezen looked away from him and rubbed her forehead. Dante sighed, it seemed like nothing he ever did even made Hezen crack a smile.

"I mean it," she said with a growl behind her voice.

Dante leaned back in the chair he was sitting in and crossed his arms behind his head. He tired to remember _everything_ Pena had explained to him earlier but he couldn't remember every little detail that Hezen would most likely want to hear.

"Well," he began, "you and I are in some kind of contract now. I've lost my human side and now it's inside _you_."

"And?"

"I…uh." Dante rolled his eyes to the ceiling. He couldn't remember anything else. "That's it."

"How do I get rid of it?"

Dante shrugged. "Dunno."

"Dammit Dante!" Hezen slammed her left fist onto the bed. "Can't you find out something more!? Who the hell told you all of that?"

"Your cat."

Hezen's face drooped. "My…what?"

"Oh…" Dante blinked. He had forgotten that Hezen didn't know about Pena's ability to talk. How was he going to explain this one?

"Bring him in," Hezen demanded.

"What?!" Dante twitched. "You want me to bring a cat here? Into a hospital?"

"I'm worried about my child!" Hezen snapped.

Dante stood. She was right; Dante had forgotten that she was pregnant through everything he had gone through himself. He walked over to the door but turned around to her instead of leaving.

"I'll throw that snap to your mood swings," he said.

"I don't care!"

With that, Dante walked out of the hospital room. Normally he wouldn't take being yelled at from anyone, but he knew that her hormones were getting the best of her. After being housed by the woman, Dante thought that he could at least put up with her snapping at him once in awhile. After all, if was his fault that her arm had been broken.

xXx

Dante arrived back at the apartment he had been calling home and walked in. He walked into Hezen's room and took a single pair of clothing for Hezen to wear when she came home. As he stuffed her clothing into a small pink gym bag, Pena walked into the room with a yawn.

"What are you doing?" Pena asked as he closed his mouth from his yawn. "Is Hezen alright?"

"She's _just_ great," Dante said in a sarcastic tone. "She wants to talk to _you_ about this contract thing."

His jaw dropped open once more. "You told her that I can talk?!"

Dante nodded. "What else was I supposed to say?"

"I don't know…something else!!

"Like what?" Dante snapped. It seemed that Hezen's mood swings were contagious.

Pena puffed up his cheeks in frustration. "Fine I'll go. There's something important I've got to tell the both of you anyways."

As Dante stuffed more clothing into the bag, Pena spotted something that he knew Hezen would like to have. He walked over to the dresser against the opposite wall and pulled open a lower drawer with his teeth.

Dante noticed what the cat was doing. "What are you doin'?" he asked.

"Getting something," Pena answered.

The cat jumped into the drawer and shifted through the clothing until he found a small picture. He pulled it out in his mouth and hopped back onto the bed. Dante looked down at the picture, and took it from Pena's small mouth.

"Hey!" Pena hissed. "I wanna give it to her!"

Dante ignored the small animal and allowed his eyes to look over the picture. It was that of a man, the same man Dante had seen on the dresser when he first arrived in Hezen's apartment. The man was leaning against a wall with a cigarette in his mouth, and his brown hair covering his right eye. He was wearing a black leather jacket and tight blue jeans that tucked down into thick black boots. A chain hung down from his waist that just amplified the 'bad ass' look.

"It's Evern," Pena said.

"She's got a thing for bad asses doesn't she?" Dante laughed and tossed the picture down into the gym bag.

"_You're_ here aren't you?"

"Shut up."

xXx

Once Dante had finished packing Hezen's clothing, Pena slipped into the bag. Dante zipped up the bag but left a small air hole so that Pena would be able to breathe. He sunk Pena into the hospital and got in once the visiting hours were over because Hezen was a doctor. He came into her room and tossed the purple bag onto the bed.

"Did you bring him?" Hezen asked.

Pena popped his head out of the bag. "Dammit Dante! Quit throwin' me around!" he hissed.

"So you can talk," Hezen said.

She leaned back against the pillow behind her and rubbed her forehead with her left arm. Thousands of thoughts were running through her head, so many that she couldn't choose which one to ask first. As she thought over everything, Pena crawled out of the bag and over to his master.

"Hezen," Pena said in a gentle tone. "I've been lying to you about who I really am. I have to talk to you about how I got here…it involves Evern."

Hezen took a deep breath inwards and then released it. "Go ahead; tell me your story."

Pena sighed. He thought that Hezen was going to decline hearing his story after the mention of Evern.

"One morning your cat was down in the parking lot, looking for some way to get out to patrol. Evern was leaving to go demon hunting when he ran over your cat with your car. He didn't want to leave your beloved cat of ten years out in the lot like that so he took a demon soul he had killed hours before and placed it in the cat," Pena explained. "That cat was _me_."

"Alright." Hezen nodded. "I can believe that."

Dante cocked his right eyebrow. "You're takin' all of this pretty easy."

Hezen moved her good arm to her forehead. "I think my fever is having an effect on my thinking ability right now. I don't know anymore…I need a damn cigarette." She shook her head. "Fine, whatever, just tell me about this contract thing Dante has been talking about."

"There is something called a contract that demons need to come into this world," Pena began. "Every demon needs a name; Dante's mother gave his human and demon side the name of Dante. That man you were fighting has the ability, apparently, to withdraw human sides of half breeds."

"You…can do that?" Hezen said as she blinked, confused.

Pena nodded his head. "It's rare but it must have something to do with his sword. I'll get back to the sword later. His _demon_ side remained unnamed and was going to go back to Hell when you renamed him and took his human side inside of you."

"So how do I get it out?" she asked.

"Get it out?" Dante chuckled. "You just got me in!"

Hezen threw Dante a glare. "I'm way not in the mood for sex jokes."

"Hey cool it," Dante said as he sat forward and placed his elbows on his knees. "I'm just as annoyed as you are."

"I'm the one sitting here with a broken arm dammit," Hezen snapped.

"_And_ _I'm_ the one sitting here without my human side," Dante countered.

Hezen decided to get back to the matter at hand. "But how did Dante lose his name for his demon side? You said his mother named both of his sides so why was he nameless when he lost his human side?"

"Dante's _entire_ being was named Dante." Pena walked closer to Hezen and sat on her lap. "When he lost half of his being, he lost his name as well. He's lucky that his human side is within you, your body is very capable of holding another soul at the present moment."

Hezen sighed and moved her good arm to her stomach. She had gotten a bit larger, now that she thought it over. Her stomach was growing everyday, and soon she would begin to pick up more and more weight while her baby began to look more and more human. The second trimester would start in a week, and left Hezen hopeful that her morning sickness would subside.

Seeing Hezen move her arm to her stomach reminded Dante that he had forgotten to ask about the child.

"How is he?" Dante asked.

"Who?" Hezen looked in Dante's direction.

"The kid." Dante pointed to Hezen's stomach.

"Oh…I didn't know who 'he' was," she said with a slight laugh. "I don't know what sex it is yet. But it's fine, thank God. The doctors said that no harm was done to him when we were getting robbed in the parking lot."

"Robbed?" Pena asked.

"Yeah I made that up," Dante said. "I told them that we got robbed in the parking lot underneath the broken light. Whatever, they bought it."

"Will having Dante's human side hurt my child?" Hezen looked back up at her cat.

Pena shook his head from side to side. "It shouldn't."

"So how I do get it out?" Hezen waited a moment to hear of Dante would say another remark but he remained strangely silent.

"We'll have to find the sword's opposite partner—"

"Great!" Dante threw his hands up into the air. "And how the hell do we find that?"

"We've got to get the other sword," Pena answered in a serious tone.

"We?" Dante laughed. "You mean _me_?"

The hair on Pena's tail stood. "Whatever Dante!! When _you_ get the sword we have to take it to someone who can read Latin and figure out its opposite sword."

"I can read Latin," Hezen said; the two boys turned back to her with looks of confusion on their faces. "I'm a doctor; most medical terms are rooted in Latin so I should know _some_."

Dante sighed. "I hope it's enough to get us by."

"_Anyway_," Pena glared at Dante, "once we find the opposite partner Hezen will have to shove the sword through her stomach to free Dante's human side."

"What!?" Dante and Hezen yelled at once.

Before Dante could yell anything more at the cat, Hezen broke out into tears. She moved her working arm to her face and tired to cover her tears as her breathing picked up. She fell back against the bed and rolled over, away from Dante.

"Hezen—"

"Just GO!" she yelled, interrupting Dante.

Dante stood and picked Pena up off of the bed. He grabbed the gym bag and dumped her clothing and the picture of Evern onto the chair he had been sitting on, and then stuffed Pena inside once more. He moved the strap over his right shoulder.

"Hezen…" Dante sighed.

"Just go," she whispered.

"Fine," Dante spat. "We'll come by to see you in the morning."

With that said, Dante walked out of the hospital room with the gym bag. He closed the door behind himself, and walked down the hospital hallways with a sigh and an extreme feeling of _guilt_ weighing down on his shoulders.

_Mood swings suck._ Dante thought.

xXx

Once Dante had dropped Pena off at home, and picked up his guns, he decided to check up on Enzo at his usual bar. He walked down to the bar, walked in, and found Enzo sitting at a table with a pale face for once.

"Somethin' wrong?" Dante asked as he walked over to the small wooden table.

Enzo sighed. "I've got a job for you Dante…it's gonna pay ten thousand dollars for one night of work."

"Great." Dante grinned. "Give it to me."

"It's back at that Hilton Hotel," Enzo admitted. He shut his eyes hard and waited for Dante to deny the job offer.

But instead Dante moved his arms out in front of him and cracked his fingers. "I'll do it!" he announced. "Don't worry about anything Enzo, I'll get this job finished _tonight_."

Enzo's eyes flew open. "Are you serious Dante!? Oh thank God! I didn't think you'd take the job after what happened there last time!"

"Don't remind me." Dante twitched. "I'll get that son of a bitch tonight and have the money in my bank account in the morning!"

"Yeah…" Enzo shifted his eyes around. "Did I mention you'd only be getting five thousand?"

xXx

Even though he was only getting half, Dante left the bar to go and finish the job at the hotel. Once he reached the hotel, he stood outside of it on the sidewalk and looked up it in awe. The hotel had changed quite a bit; all of the lights were shining brightly as people walked in and out of the hotel. He could see people inside of the hotel through the glass doors running around with suitcases behind them, and merchants chasing after them for money.

_Wow. _Dante blinked in awe. _This place as really turned around from the last time I was here. I might wanna get a room here._

Dante walked in through the glass doors and into the lobby. He looked up and watched people walk around for a few minutes before he began looking around for the demon he had fought with before. There wasn't a single trace of the demon around. Everything seemed normal.

"Dante," a male voice said.

He turned around and froze at the image behind him. There stood the man Dante had come to know as Evern. Through the pictures Dante had seen, this man looked _exactly _like Evern, down to the chain around his waist.

"What the hell are you trying to pull?" Dante growled.

"So you can finally see me?" Evern asked with a laugh. "I've been wondering when you were going to see my true form."

"True form?" Dante cocked his right eyebrow.

"He's got a gun!" a woman screamed from behind Dante.

"Someone call security!!" another woman yelled.

"There goes my cover." Dante rolled his eyes. "So what are you doing here Evern? Aren't you supposed to be dead?"

Evern laughed. "That's the good thing about having a demon body; it's hard to die when you've been stabbed through the stomach."

Dante grinned. "You would think that killing a thousand angels would turn you fully human these days. Damn old legends."

"No the legend worked." Evern shook his head back and forth. "I have your brother to thank for the body I'm using now."

Dante's eyes grew wide. "My brother?"

xXx

Hezen walked down the dark streets near her apartment with a hurry in her step. She hated being out _this_ late in the dark but she had to get home. She had discharged herself from the hospital and wanted to get home _now_. A deep missing tore away within her to get back home and to see Pena…and even Dante. It was the picture of Evern Dante had brought to her that made Hezen want to return home. She just wanted to sleep in her own bed and eat her own food. Being in the hospital as a patient instead of a doctor gave Hezen an uneasy feeling that she couldn't rid herself of.

_Almost there. _Hezen told herself. _Just a little while longer._

She stepped under another streetlight and felt safe for a few seconds before she stepped back into the darkness she feared. She soon entered the parking garage of her apartment complex and as she walked up to the elevator, she heard the sound of boots clunking on the ground behind her.

_Don't be a wacko, don't be a wacko._ She repeated in her head.

The clunking behind her grew louder and louder until Hezen couldn't hear them anymore against the cement. A hand came down on her left shoulder and spun her around violently. She hissed in pain when a large hand grabbed her throat.

"Why do I sense Dante on you?" a male voice asked in anger. "A mere human?"

Hezen opened her eyes as pain shot down her broken arm and saw a face that made the color drain from her. Adrenaline began pumping through Hezen's body as the instinct to run overpowered her ability to think. This person who was holding her and now choking her was the man she never wanted to see again. _Never_.

Vergil.

* * *

R&R please! 


	11. Small Print

Thank you for reviewing** Demerah** and **Lunatic Pandora1.**

Please remember that this takes place a year before DMC 3. This is supposed to be the meeting of Vergil and Dante that Dante referred to in DMC 3; the first time they've met since the death of their Mother. Just wanted to add that so this story fits well into the storyline.

Enjoy!

* * *

"My brother?" Dante asked.

"Vergil," Evern confirmed with a nod of his head. "He's looking for you right now. He can sense your energy easily Dante."

Dante started to laugh when he thought of something. A part of _his_ power was _inside_ of _Hezen_. Since Vergil didn't seem to be at the hotel, Dante figured that Vergil had to be outside looking for him. What if Vergil picked up on his energy coming out of Hezen's body?

"Shit." Dante bit his lower lip.

What if Vergil killed Hezen? What would happen to him? Would his human side disappear or come back to him? Dante shook his head a bit. How could he think something so selfish when another life, no another _two_ lives were at risk?

"I've got somethin' to tell ya Evern," Dante said with a grin. "I'm gonna leave you here alright? I've got someone more important to take care of."

"Really?" Evern laughed. "What makes you think I'm going to let you out of here?"

"Hold it right there!" a security guard yelled as he, and three more guards appeared beside him. "Drop your weapon!!"

Dante ignored the guards. "This."

Dante unleashed Ebony and Ivory onto Evern. Bullets tore through Evern's body, sending blood everywhere. But instead of falling down from his injuries, Evern continued to stand with a grin on his face. Dante ran to Evern's left side and began backing up to the front door while the security guards ran over to Evern.

"Are you going to Hezen?" Evern asked over the sound of Ebony and Ivory. "Are you going to play dragon to my princess?"

"I ain't gonna play anything!" Dante yelled. "I've got a debt to pay!"

"Debt?" Evern said as bullets ran through his body. "You don't know anything about _debt_ you disgusting half breed."

The bullets stopped flying into Evern's body as Dante ran out of the door of the hotel. Guards chased after Dante while two walked over to Evern and began to give him medical attention.

"You can finally see me," Evern whispered.

"Hold still sir!" a guard ordered.

Evern lowered his head. "You disgust me."

With a single move that was too fast for human eyes, Evern moved his arms across the guard's waists, and tore them in half. Blood splashed back onto Evern's face, but it didn't seem to bother him; in fact it made a smile cross his face. The top half of the guard's bodies fell to the floor along with their torn missing halves. A woman screamed at the top of lungs.

"This is paradise," Evern whispered.

xXx

"Tell me," Vergil tightened his grip on Hezen's neck, "why do you have Dante's power within you?"

Hezen's left and clawed at the hand around her neck. Even if she wanted to answer she couldn't because of the intensity of the grip around her neck. She tried to take a large breath inwards but his hand prevented that as well. Vergil watched Hezen struggle for a few seconds more and then dropped her to his feet. She kicked out away from him until her back slammed against a wall behind her.

"Answer me," Vergil ordered.

She couldn't find her voice. Those icy eyes looking back at her forced her to relive all of the horrible memories of Evern's death. Her entire body began to shiver in fear as her stomach knotted and her breathing increased. She had never been this scared in her life.

"Do you know where Dante is?" Vergil asked in a cooler, less demanding tone.

Her voice still wouldn't come to her. Her stomach cramped just as it had done during Dante's fight with the mysterious man. Before she could try and gain control over her body once more, she fell onto her left hand and threw up.

Vergil curled his upper lip. "Disgusting."

Hezen entered a coughing fit once she had emptied her stomach. She felt so exhausted from the previous fight she thought she had recovered from. Her right arm was throbbing in pain from being moved around. As she tried to recover from throwing up, Vergil walked over to her, laced his fingers through her hair, and forced her to look up at him.

"You reek of my brother," Vergil hissed. "Now where _is he_?"

"Dead," she answered after finding her voice.

He laughed sarcastically. "I doubt it. Tell me where he is before I spill your child onto the floor."

That single line made time slow. Hezen sat there, looking up in Vergil's eyes in fear. Even though they matched Dante's in color and look, they missed that wonderful light Hezen had gotten used to. How could two pairs of eyes be so different?

As Hezen became lost in her thoughts, Vergil's Yamato cut her left hand deeply in an attempt to get her attention. She whimpered out in pain but soon the fear took over the pain, and she began to forget about it.

"Dante," Hezen whispered, "please come."

"So he's alive?" Vergil blinked. "Why is he hiding his powers within you? A weak human like yourself couldn't hold the powers of Sparda...how are you doing it?"

"I hate you," she hissed.

He only laughed. "And why do I care? I'll ask you once more: where is Dante?"

A loud bang came from behind Vergil. He turned around with his fingers still laced through Hezen's hair. There stood Dante with Ebony and Ivory out towards Vergil, and a grin on his face. Vergil forced Hezen down to the ground, and then turned around to face his younger brother.

"There you are Dante," Vergil said in a calm tone. "I've been looking for you."

"Why?" Dante laughed. "Why the hell would you be lookin' for me?"

Vergil walked towards his younger brother. "You've changed in the years I haven't seen you."

Dante kept the sights on his gun locked onto Vergil. To tell the truth, Dante was nervous. This was the first time he had seen his brother since their Mother's death but Dante felt as if they had never parted. Seeing Vergil again did however bring back memories Dante didn't need to cloud his judgment at the current moment. Vergil was _real_ he was _alive_ which just reminded Dante of how his Mother died.

"Yeah well so have you," Dante spat. "I see you've met a dear friend of mine. Recognize her?"

Vergil blinked, confused. "Why should I?"

Dante shook his head. "Never mind," he answered. It wasn't his place to talk about Evern's death with Hezen so close by. "But what are you doing in town big bro? Besides looking for me of course…"

Vergil shook his head back and forth. "Can you not feel it Dante?"

"What?"

"The power surging through this town," Vergil answered. "I was drawn here because of the power running through the city when I felt a power similar to mine. But instead of coming across you, I discovered the wench behind me."

"Watch it," Dante warned. "Well now that you've found me what are you going to do with me?"

Vergil closed his eyes. "I've come to offer you power. The power that was given to us by our Father, Sparda. Come with me Dante, and gain the power our Father refused to expand upon. The world will bow in fear to a power as great as ours. Come Dante."

"Don't!" Hezen screamed out as she shook her head back and forth. "Dante!! Don't listen to him!"

Vergil drew his Yamato and swung it over Hezen's neck just enough to leave a sallow, bleeding cut. The end of his blade stayed near the right side of her face as he shot a glare in her direction.

"Do not interrupt human," Vergil warned.

A bullet grazed by Vergil's right cheek and blood began to seep from the cut. Vergil turned back around and spotted Ivory with a smoking barrel.

"Dante?" Vergil asked.

"Back away bro," Dante said.

Before Vergil could say anything else to his brother, he felt a raise in the power coming from Hezen. He looked back towards Hezen when another power boost suddenly came from his younger brother. The more Hezen's power grew, Dante's did, and vice versa. This wasn't right.

"What is she doing with your power?" Vergil asked as he removed his sword away from Hezen's neck.

"I don't think that's any of your business." Dante took a step closer towards his brother. "Now why don't we take this outside like gentlemen?"

"Don't!" Hezen yelled once more. "Dante…you can't do this!"

Dante chuckled. "Don't worry! This 'ell get done in a minute!"

"You can't!" Hezen shook her head back and forth as she began to cry. "You'll end up just like Evern!"

Vergil perked at that name. "Evern?" he repeated.

Hezen's emotions began to get the better of her, and before she could stop herself, she tapped in Dante's powers. She began pushing Dante's powers forward with the fear of losing him just as she had lost Evern. Dante could feel a deep, burning in the bottom of his stomach but for some reason, he _liked_ it.

Vergil narrowed his eyes towards his twin. "What are you doing?"

"I don't know but I like it!" Dante grinned.

"This is what I've been looking for," Vergil said. "This power that has been hidden by our Father. Come and join me Dante, come and join me so that the world can once again tremble at the name of Sparda."

"Sparda?" Dante let go of a laugh as he released a large breath of air. "Why are you siding with them Vergil? After all, they're the bastards that killed our Mother."

Vergil closed his eyes. "Dante, you fail to understand the offer I'm presenting."

Dante lifted his guns. "Ain't the first time."

The parking lot grew silent as one twin waited for the other to make the first move. Vergil could feel Dante's power spike once more and soon after, Hezen's spiked. He stood for a moment, and counted the seconds in his head that it took for Hezen's power to spike after Dante's. Ten seconds.

"That's it," Vergil whispered.

With one last count to ten, Vergil drew his Yamato and charged Dante. Dante abandoned his guns and drew Rebellion from his back. The two ran out towards one another with their weapons and within an instant the swords of the Sparda brother's clashed for the first time.

xXx

Pena woke from his sleep with a sudden shutter. The small cat could feel energy waves of demons running through the entire building that made his whiskers move back and forth. He stood from Hezen's bed and ran to the front door.

"That's Dante's power," he whispered.

Another large wave of energy traveled through out the air but this power brought Pena down to his feet with a pressure he couldn't fight. He struggled to stand against the power level as he pushed himself off of the floor.

"Shit," he cursed. "Dante's dead meat if he's up against something like this."

The pressure lifted within a few seconds and Pena stood. He looked up towards the lock on the door and jumped up to it. With a twist of his paws, Pena managed to unlock the door. When he hit the floor once more, he jumped and opened the door. He ran into the stairway and felt the power coming from the parking lot.

"You'd better be winning this fight." Pena ran down the stairs as fast as he could.

xXx

Rebellion pressed against Yamato; sparks flew out from the cross where the two met. Dante moved in to where the two swords met to get a better look at his older brother.

"Why did you drop your firearms?" Vergil asked with no strain behind his voice.

"Wouldn't be a fair fight!" Dante said.

"Fair fight?" Vergil chuckled. "Being in the human world _has_ ruined you brother."

A sudden pain came to Hezen's chest as she watched the fight. She pressed herself against the wall behind her and held tightly to her chest as the pain grew harder and hotter.

The longer Hezen looked at Vergil, the more fear and adrenaline ran through her system that only fueled Dante's power. Every time she watched Vergil bring down his katana towards Dante, her mind flew back to the moment she witnessed Evern's death. With every blink of her eyes Dante became more and more like Evern until he _became_ Evern.

She shook her head and focused on the power running through her. The moment she focused the power within her chest, the pain increased.

"Dante," she whispered. "Dante…you can't do this. Stop it!"

Dante's power level shot up twice as fast as it had before. He began changing just as he had with the fight with the strange man; his eyes changed to a blood red color, and his skin began to crack and fall away to reveal a dark skin underneath it. Vergil ignored the changes in his younger brother, and repeated to slam his katana against Rebellion. Dante withdrew Rebellion from Vergil's katana and as he did so, Dante sliced across Vergil's hand.

"Not much longer!" Dante yelled. "Come on Vergil! Show me what else you've got!"

"Not much longer?" Vergil pushed himself up against Dante and laid his open right hand on Dante's chest. "You must not realize that I have already won this fight."

Vergil moved the injury to his hand against a black opening on Dante's skin, and forced his blood against the black skin there.

Dante dropped to the floor. Hezen screamed.

"I see that you've entered a demon-human contract," Vergil said as he stood over Dante. "You're such a fool; you've failed to realize what you have to do in order to live."

The power Dante had been using to fight Vergil began to attack his own body. He felt his skin falling away at a quicker rate then before until the entire right side of his body was nothing but a dark color. His knees bent in to his stomach while his hands changed to claws.

"Become a demon Dante." Vergil kicked Dante in the stomach. "Show me what Sparda left within you, what you didn't leave within that weak human behind us."

"Son of a bitch," Dante groaned.

"DANTE!" Hezen screamed.

Dante had never heard someone scream the way Hezen called out his name. He looked up and saw her squirming on the floor in pain.

"H-Hezen," Dante choked out.

In the fighting he had been doing for so many years, he never had to fight while protecting someone before. The thought of Hezen kept slipping from his mind as he concentrated on what was going on with him. He moved his right arm towards her but she was just too far away.

The pain running through her body was something she never could have imagined. Every bone, every muscle, every fiber of her being ached with a hot pain. Already in so much pain, Hezen forgot about her broken arm and moved it down to cradle her stomach. She moved her head to the side and threw up because of the pain running through her small body.

"Please," she choked as spit and vomit dripped from her mouth, "please I don't want to lose this baby. Please God," she begged. "I can't lose this child."

"_But no matter what I'm going to keep this child, I'm not going to give up."_

"Change dammit!" Vergil kicked Dante once more, taking his attention away from Hezen's suffering. "What don't you understand Dante? You must transform in order to receive this power!"

"Screw off Vergil," Dante hissed.

Vergil grabbed his katana and stabbed it through Dante's right shoulder, pinning him to the ground with his right arm over his head. A dark, thick blood began to pour out of the new wound to Dante that informed Vergil that Dante was _almost_ there.

A sudden squeak broke Vergil's attention from Dante. The door to the parking lot swung open, bearing missing Hezen's legs. Pena jumped out from the hallway behind the door and landed in front of Hezen.

"Pena," Hezen whispered.

"_Vergil_," Pena hissed loudly. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Pena?" Vergil cocked his right eyebrow.

The fur along Pena's spine stood. "Get away from them _now_. I've set up a barrier around this place but you've still got a change to escape."

"Large threats from such a small pest." Vergil removed his sword from Dante and began walking towards Pena and Hezen.

"Back off!" Pena stood up on his toes and arched his back.

Vergil ignored Pena's orders and stood in front of the cat. A bright pink wall formed around Pena and Vergil only, separating them from Hezen and Dante. Vergil kicked the wall as if to test it only to find that it was, in fact, solid. Disappointed, Vergil returned his glare to Pena.

"You still have some energy," Vergil said. "I thought Evern drained them all from you."

"I'm stronger now." Pena relaxed. "Fight me Vergil!"

"Fight a cat?" Vergil gave a small laugh.

"I'm not asking you to fight me as a cat," Pena glared towards Vergil, "but as the guardian angel I am."

xXx

Hezen could no longer hear what had been going on around her. The only sound coursing through her ears was the sound of her own heart beat. She timed her movements with her beating heart as she dragged herself along the ground and over towards Dante.

"Dante," she whimpered. "We…we gotta get outta this. It can't end like this."

Desperation. This desperation Hezen had only felt it once, but back then she couldn't do anything no matter how many times she told herself she could. Now she could do something, and she wasn't going to sit back and die.

She crawled on her right side and stretched her left arm out towards one of Dante's hands. Blood dripped out from her injured left hand but she didn't care. She moved it towards the up turned palm of Dante's right hand, and smacked her hand down on top of his.

"Dante…no. Get up NOW DAMMIT!" she screamed.

The blood from Hezen's injury leaked out from her hand, and fell into the cut on Dante's palm. The blood traveled through Dante's body and began healing all of the wounds on his body and restoring all of Dante's old powers. The human powers that had escaped Dante were coming back to him.

His eyes fluttered open. "Vergil…Hezen?"

She sighed. "Dante, get up and fight."

"What the hell?" he asked.

"Do you remember anything?"

He paused for a moment while the memories flooded his mind. "Oh shit. Just give me a minute and I'll get right back up."

She managed a smile as the pain in her body began to leave as well. "Great."

xXx

"And how do you want to fight me?" Vergil asked with a smirk across his face. "A guardian angel trapped within a cat's body doesn't seem like a 'fair fight'," he quoted Dante.

Pena lowered his head. "_Invidia_," he whispered.

A pressure came to the small box the two were in. Vergil's hair fell from its normal up position as his ankles cracked. Pena began to pant.

"What are you doing?" Vergil growled.

"Invoking the Seven Deadly Sins to crush the both of us," Pena said through panting.

"You'll kill yourself before then, angel," Vergil spat. "You don't have the power you used to have, don't lie to me or yourself. Admit your defeat now."

Pena gritted his teeth together. "Shut up."

A blast of energy from the right side shattered the wall Pena had put up and destroyed the spell the cat had used as well. Vergil moved his attention to the right and saw Dante standing up as if nothing were wrong with him.

"Now where were we bro?" Dante asked. "Oh yeah," he took out both of his guns, "right here."

* * *

R&R please! 


	12. Call Attention To

Thank you to **Lexaheart, Lunatic Pandora1** and **Demerah **for reviewing! Don't worry, everything that's a bit confusing will work out later! Oh and don't worry, the power Hezen gets is the ONLY power she'll get.

Enjoy

* * *

"Now where were we bro?" Dante asked. "Oh yeah," he took out both of his guns, "right here."

Pena jumped backwards as Dante pulled the triggers on Ebony and Ivory over and over again. Vergil moved his katana in front of him and ran out towards Dante as the bullets grazed his face.

xXx

"Hezen!" Pena jumped to his fallen master's side. "Are you alright Hezen?"

She gave a weak nod. "I'll be fine. I'm healing."

"You'd better move against the wall while the two are fighting!" Pena yelled over the gunfire. "I've got a barrier up around this place so no one can interfere and one around you."

Hezen blinked. "What about Dan—"

"He's a big demon!" Pena pushed himself against Hezen, telling her that he wanted her to move. "We've got to worry about you and your child."

She walked over to a wall and leaned against it as Pena stood in front of her. Hezen moved her good arm around her stomach and looked up towards Dante's fight as she folded her knees as much as her growing belly would allow.

"How can I help?" she asked.

"Just wait," Pena answered. "I'll tell you what to do, when you have to do something. Until then just relax and take care of your arm."

xXx

Dante jumped backwards when Vergil grew too close for comfort while unleashing another round of bullets towards him. Vergil swiped his Yamato and sent the bullets flying in random directions. Vergil's actions gave Dante enough time to place his guns away and draw Rebellion once more.

"Why don't you come with me Dante?" Vergil asked. "We'll gain power enough to rule the world our Father failed to."

"Not if I have to join up with the murdering bastards who took our Mother!" Dante yelled as their blades crashed once more.

"We must gain power Dante!" Vergil's sword slipped through Dante's defense and cut his right cheek open. "How can you not understand that?"

The two brothers stopped their fighting for a moment to stare at one another. Dante's chest moved up and down while he opened his mouth to catch the breath he had lost during the fight. Vergil, however, didn't seem effected by the fight at all.

"Our 'Father' left our Mother to die," Dante said between panting. "Why would I want to live up to that?"

Vergil shook his head, disappointed. "Dante you fail to understand the power resting within you and this town. And until you understand, I have to make sure that you do not interfere with my plans."

Dante rolled his eyes. "And how are you going to do that?"

"By weakening you."

This time, Dante sprinted out towards his brother. He didn't know what was wrong with him, but hearing Vergil speak of weakening him made Dante want to rip him apart. Dante wanted to prove how strong he had gotten in the past years, and prove that he could beat Vergil if he wanted. This fight, Dante figured, would be the one to prove how he had grown without his brother.

Vergil stood his ground while Dante's blade slammed into his. They began moving through out the parking lot, fighting one another to no end. In the middle of sparks flying, Dante pulled out Ebony and fired a round towards Vergil only to have Vergil dodge it with ease.

"You've entered a demon-human contract," Vergil said over the sounds of their blades. "Do you know what that means?"

Dante laughed sarcastically. "Do I care?"

"Fool."

Vergil swept his Yamato over the top of Dante's forehead and created a deep gash. Blood fell over Dante's eyes and blinded him for a moment. Within that moment, Vergil cut his own hand enough to bleed and smacked it against Dante's forehead. Vergil's blood spilled into Dante's wound as the surge of demon energy exploded deep within Dante once more.

"Shit," he muttered.

"Why did Mother bother to protect such a weak thing?" Vergil whispered.

xXx

"Dammit," Hezen squeaked in pain. She bent forward a bit as a pressure came to her belly.

Pena turned to face her. "Now Hezen you have to fight!"

"What?" Hezen groaned while beads of sweat began to travel down her forehead. "How the hell am I-I supposed to fight?"

"Concentrate!" Pena ordered. "You've got to think about the fight! Push the pain away the best you can for Dante."

Hezen closed her eyes while she took in deep breaths. The pain in her stomach was too much, she couldn't do this. Her fists balled up as the pain grew more intense for her to control. There was no way she could control something like that in the state she was in.

"I-I can't!" she blurted out. "I can't do it!!"

"If you don't do it Dante will die!" Pena hissed. "You're controlling his human side, without that he can't heal and his reflexes are weak! Concentrate!!"

Her eyes widened at that. She sat there, watching as Vergil grabbed Dante's head and slammed it into a nearby wall. Dante couldn't move nor heal without his human side. Nothing could protect Dante. There was _no one_ to protect Dante. The more Hezen sat there with nothing to do, the angrier she got. She _had to do something_. She wasn't going to sit here and watch Dante die, no not again. She was not going to let Dante die like Evern had.

"Dante!" Hezen screamed as she closed her eyes once more.

She sat forward a bit until she was on her knees. With a small push, she stood as her legs wobbled underneath her. Even though her wounds had healed, she could still feel where they had been inflected. She leaned against the wall behind her and returned her attention to Dante and Vergil.

"You've got to do something!" Pena said. "Dante's going to—"

"No he's not." Hezen shook her head. "I'll think of something."

"Think faster!!"

The pain in Hezen's stomach came once more as Dante's skin cracked. He was starting to revert back to his demon side just as he had done before. Hezen pressed against the pain in her stomach with her muscles while her breathing increased.

"I'm not going to lose this child or Dante," Hezen told herself out loud. "I'm never going to be helpless again."

Images of Evern's death shifted through out her mind. Once again, the feel of the cold wind and rain that night felt as if they were all hitting her at once while warm blood trickled down her arms and legs. She could feel Evern's warm body become cold once more as she screamed out his name but never got a response. Everything was coming back to her the more she watched Dante change into his demon form.

"Dante," she whispered as she lowered her head.

"Do something!" Pena's fur stood once more as he prepared himself for a fight. "Hurry up!!"

The sound of a body hitting the floor caught Hezen's attention. She looked back up towards the fight to see Dante on the floor and Vergil standing over him, with his Yamato pointed down towards Dante's heart.

"This is it brother," Vergil said. "Come with me to power, or lose everything."

Dante's usual smirk returned. "Piss off," he groaned as blood spilled from his mouth.

Vergil placed the tip of his katana against Dante's chest. Vergil could feel Dante's heart vibrations running up and down his katana, telling him that he was in the right place.

"Dante!!" Hezen screamed. "Don't Dante!! Get up."

"Goddammit," Dante whispered.

He couldn't move, he couldn't feel anything, and now all he could hear was the sound of Hezen screaming out for him. Dante never wanted it to end this way, but in the back of his mind he knew that he was going to live. Somehow, someway Dante was going to live. Death was something Dante refused to accept, even though he was staring right at it, right at his brother.

"Vergil." Dante's eyes rolled to the back of his head.

Vergil lifted his Yamato and began to bring it back down when something inside of Hezen snapped. One word came to her mind that seemed to brighten the darkness of her mind.

"Shield!" she screamed.

A white bubble appeared and wrapped itself around Dante. Vergil's katana bounced off of the shield, and pushed him backwards a few feet. Hezen took the opportunity and ran to Dante while the white shield disappeared. She kneeled down beside him, and cradled his body close to her chest, ignoring the pain in her right arm.

"What the hell?" Vergil muttered as he walked back over to the two.

"Again Hezen!!" Pena yelled from the other side of the room.

Vergil stood in front of Dante and Hezen with is Yamato in wait. Hezen locked eyes with him but this time she wasn't afraid of them. This time she was angry and knew exactly what she had to protect.

"I'm not giving up this time," she said. "I'm not going to allow you to take Dante!"

Her hair began to move upwards. Vergil could feel her power level rising once more only this time it was different, this time he could feel Dante's rising _along with it_. There was no ten second delay; their powers were now perfectly aligned.

"Shield!" Hezen called.

The white bubble returned and engulfed both Hezen and Dante's body. The energy pushed Vergil back once more and broke the barrier Pena had placed up around the apartment building. Vergil jumped out of the parking lot to avoid the small explosion and heard the sounds of sirens nearing.

"Damn," he whispered. He looked back towards the parking lot. "That should keep you down for a while, Dante."

While a police car turned the corner, Vergil jumped backwards onto a building and disappeared into the night.

xXx

"Evern!!"

Evern found himself standing in front of a large marble throne in a large, dark room. The walls of the room were a dark red color with a thickness Evern often compared to that of blood. Beside Evern stood the strange man who had attacked Dante and Hezen, and who had given Dante's human side to Hezen.

"Evern are you listening?" the man in the chair asked.

The man in the chair had a short, chubby disposition about him. Evern knew his name well; after all, the man in the chair was the mayor of the town. Saizin was the name the people of the city called him, Evern, however, knew him as master.

"Yes." Evern nodded. "You're disappointed in the fact that I failed to bring Dante here."

"Very!" Saizin barked. "Why can't you be like your partner Wellon? _He_ got something done!"

Evern lowered his head. "I'm sorry master."

Saizin sighed and leaned against his large chair. "We must weaken Dante and take his body! We have to accomplish or mission before the winter solstice!"

"But the summer solstice hasn't even arrived," the other man, Wellon, said.

Saizin slammed his right fist into his chair. "I don't care! In six months our deadline will be upon us and if we don't extract Dante's soul before then all three of us will die! Do you understand that?"

"I do," Wellon said.

Evern brought his head back up. "But master I don't—"

"Don't speak," Saizin said as he raised his right hand. "I didn't bring you back from the dead for you to correct me."

"Yes sir." Evern bowed.

xXx

"_Dante RUN_!"

_The smell of burning wood moved deep within Dante's nose while his eyes peeked out from a small hole in the wall. The wall was what separated him from his dying Mother, and presumably dead brother. His blue eyes watched his Mother's blood hit the walls, the wooden floors, and ceiling fan._

"_Mom," Dante whispered. _

"Why did Mother bother to protect such a weak thing?"

_Dante's eyes winded. "Mom?" he whispered once more. "Vergil?"_

_The giant black demon that hovered over his Mother took one looks around the small house and then looked up towards the blood soaked ceiling. Dante ducked away from the hole he had been looking through to avoid being caught._

"_Sparda's woman and children have been taken care of," the demon said in a deep, crackling voice. "Inform The Gathering."_

"_The Gathering?" another, this time high pitched, voice answered. "Why would they need to know? They are nothing but low ranking demons!"_

"_Because this order was given by them," the other hissed. "Now we must get moving before humans stumble upon us."_

_Dante listened as the demon's claws hit the wooden floor over and over again. He sat there for what felt like hours, waiting for the demons to leave so he could check on his Mother and brother. He counted to one hundred in his head, and then stepped into the bloody living room._

"_Mom?" Dante asked. "Mom?"_

_There, lying in the middle of the living room, still breathing, was the body of his beloved Mother._

"_MOMMY!" he cried._

xXx

"Hey Dante. Dante, wake up already!!"

Dante could hear Pena's voice calling to him. His eyes fluttered open as the sound of rain came to him at the same time. Gentle warmth was the next thing he felt as his senses came back to him that came from a comforter that had been placed on top of his shirtless body.

"Wha?" Dante asked. "What the hell happened?"

He sat up slowly and saw Hezen sleeping beside him. They were in her bed with the buzz of a fan coming from the doorway. He looked around the room but stopped when he spotted a man standing near the wall of windows.

The man stood at short stature with long blond hair that fell down to his waist in a loose ponytail. He looked back towards Dante with a pair of bright green eyes and a mole underneath his right one. He wore a black leather top with his arms exposed and jeans with white socks.

"'Bout time you woke up Dante," the man said in a very familiar voice.

Dante paused. "…Pena?"

"Yeah it's me," Pena answered. "I discovered that after you're little fight I was able to transform to my normal side for eleven minutes."

"Just great." Dante sighed. "Another body to walk around."

"Anyways," Pena crossed his arms, "Vergil has disappeared. I've been looking for him but I can't find him at all. I couldn't find that Evern copy man you were babbling about in your sleep."

"Did you tell Hezen?"

Pena shook his head. "No. She's been out for a while now."

"How long _is _that?"

"She's been out for half a day; you on the other hand, have been out for three days."

"Dammit," Dante hissed. "I'd better get some missions done before I'm out of a job."

Pena shrugged. "Whatever Dante. You've got more to worry about now then just a job."

"I've got _a lot_ more to worry about then you know," Dante countered.

With that, Dante slipped out of bed and walked out of the bedroom. Pena sighed, reverted back to his cat form, and jumped onto the bed beside Hezen where he fell asleep. Dante moved through the living room and out onto the balcony, a place where he had never been before.

"Shit," he muttered.

On the balcony Dante found a blue plastic chair to sit in. He sat, and looked up towards the gray sky as rain fell down in front of him. It was cold without a shirt, but Dante didn't care, his mind was too busy elsewhere.

Vergil was _alive_. Vergil had _lived_ that night their Mother had been murdered. These past ten years Dante had been telling himself over and over again that Vergil was dead so knowing now that he was alive seemed so…surreal. Knowing that Vergil was out in the world, talking to someone, eating, or sleeping was something Dante found comfort and anger in.

When Dante had heard Hezen and Pena say that Vergil had killed Evern, Dante didn't believe them. In the back of his mind Vergil was still dead and he knew, he knew _without_ a doubt that Vergil hadn't been the one to kill Evern.

"But he's not dead," he whispered. "He's alive dammit. That bastard is alive."

"_Why did Mother bother to protect such a weak thing?"_

Dante shook his head. _What the hell was that supposed to mean?_S

A boom of thunder caught Dante's attention. He looked towards the sky once more when a sudden sharp pain came from his left palm. He turned his left hand up and saw a scar there.

"_Dante…no. Get up NOW DAMMIT!"_

_I don't know what she did._ Dante touched the scar only to find that it was still a bit tender. _But whatever it was, it saved all of us._

He ran his fingers down his face as another blast of thunder ripped through the sky. Once his fingers had left his face, he leaned forward and rested his elbows against his bent knees.

"Evern." Dante shook his head.

Was that really him? Could that man he met who looked exactly like the Evern in the pictures really be the true blue Evern? And even if it was Evern, why the hell was he up and running around?

The glass door opened and Hezen walked onto the balcony. Her hair was down and her arm had been wrapped in a thick bandage while being held up by a new, thicker sling. She stepped out beside Dante and stared up towards the sky.

"Morin' sleeping beauty," Dante teased.

"Flattery isn't going to get you anywhere," she said in a low, tired tone. "I just came out here to watch the lighting and then I'm going back to bed."

Dante twitched; her mood swings were back.

"Why is your hair down?" he asked. It was the only thing he could think of saying at such an awkward moment.

"I can't put it back on my own." She moved her broken arm to prove her point. "Pena's back to his normal self so he can't help me."

"Oh."

A streak of lighting lit up the sky for a second, and then a blast of thunder came after. The two watched as the lighting disappeared against the gray night sky and come again a few minutes later.

"It's a mile away," Hezen said.

Dante blinked. "I counted two."

"A mile and a half then," Hezen compromised. "What do you want for dinner before you head out to work?"

Dante shrugged. "I don't know…pizza."

She nodded. "Sounds fine. I can't really cook like this anyway."

The lightening came once more, and was followed by thunder. Hezen sighed and walked over to the edge of the balcony. She moved her left arm out towards the rain, letting the water trickle down her palm. Dante watched as he crossed his ankles, and placed them down onto a cooler in front of him.

"We have to go shopping soon," she said.

"Great." He sighed. "When?"

"Tomorrow. We'll go whenever _you_ wake up."

A grin crossed Dante's face. "Sounds good to me!"

Even with Hezen out on the balcony with him, it was so damn cold.

* * *

R&R please! 


	13. Untold Flaw

Thanks to for reviewing! Anyways, this chapter will make a lot more things clear, and I hope you can understand everything that's going on. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to PM me.

Enjoy!

* * *

"Can I get this?" 

Three days had passed since the attack from Vergil, and nothing had happened: no attacks, no strange demons running around, no nothing. Now, however, Dante and Hezen were stuck shopping at a grocery store to stock up on things Dante had eaten. As much as Hezen liked having Dante around, he ate more then she could cook. Dante, regardless of Hezen's mood, was in a rather playful mood while Hezen, on the other hand…wasn't. The whole demon contract business worried the hell out of Hezen, preventing her mood to shift at all. It didn't seem to bother Dante at all; he said they would talk about when he got home from a job that night.

"Yes you can get that," Hezen answered back with a twitch. "I told you that you could get anything you wanted."

"Ya sure?"

"Yes!" she hissed.

Dante tossed a large bag of chips into the metal shopping cart that was already half way full. He pushed it down the aisle packed with chips as Hezen walked beside him.

It was a bit strange for Dante to get whatever he wanted. Hezen said she would pay for everything at the current moment while the money Dante got from his jobs went to the rent for the shop and the maintenance there. Dante felt a bit bad that Hezen was paying for everything, but she wouldn't take any money from him, no matter how much he told her to. Dante would get revenge on her though; he was only buying items that on sale, or generic brands he would have bought if trying to save money.

"Will you _please_ get something besides that cheap food?" Hezen asked with a roll of her eyes. "I _really_ don't care."

"Hey _I'm_ buying," Dante hissed. "I'll get whatever _I_ want."

"But _I'm_ paying for it." Hezen closed her eyes. "How about you cook something tonight?"

"Like?"

She shrugged. "Whatever you want. I'm starving."

Dante rolled his eyes. "Fine, I'll make my famous three bean chili then."

"I don't have a problem with that."

The two walked into a long aisle where Dante continued throwing cheap food into the cart. Hezen sighed at the sight, and moved to the other side of the aisle to look at the Mexican foods there.

That damn demon contract came to mind as Hezen's eyes scanned the many items there. Why wouldn't this thing leave her alone? "Are we going to talk about this contract thing tonight?" Hezen whispered.

Dante stopped placing food in the cart. "Yeah. Durin' dinner we'll talk about it," he answered.

xXx

When eight o'clock finally hit, Dante had finished making his chili. He served it to Hezen who sat on the couch with a look of frustration and impatience on her face. Pena decided to sit down in the computer chair in front of the couch in his normal cat form. Dante flopped down onto the couch beside Hezen with a bowl and cup in his hands. Pena waited a few moments for his food, but instead of standing Dante cuddled himself into the couch beneath him.

"Hey!" Pena perked. "Where's _my_ food?"

"I cooked it," Dante leaned into the couch, "you can get it yourself."

Pena's mouth dropped open. "You served Hezen!"

"She's got a broken arm," Dante said as he brought a spoonful of red chili to his mouth. "Get up lazy butt."

The fur on Pena's back rose a bit. "Never mind! I don't want your food anyway! I'll eat Seafood Delight for dinner!"

"Can we please get to the point?" Hezen said with a roll of her eyes. "We're here to talk about this contract thing and what happened during the fight with Vergil."

"Fine, fine." Pena sighed and crossed one paw over the other. "What's happening with your blood is something I didn't know would happen."

"What is it?" Dante asked with a mouthful of food.

"Lemme finish!!" Pena barked. "Anyway," he coughed, "because you're missing your human side, you don't have full access to your powers. You need the blood of a human running through you to unleash all of your powers, thus the power launch when Hezen's blood got into you."

"So," Dante swallowed his food, "I need Hezen's blood to unleash all of _my_ powers."

Pena nodded. "Yes. Once you spill devil blood without human blood _with_ it, you and Hezen will suffer."

Dante took his turn and rolled his eyes. "Great. What was with that shield thing?"

"It's a spell Hezen's been granted," Pena explained. "Because your mother gave you your human side, died protecting you, and your human side is now in Hezen who is an expectant mother, she gets the power to _protect_ you. Calling a shield will protect you from any kind of danger."

"But I _don't_ need help," Dante insisted.

"Maybe you do now," Pena said. "Something is going on in this town…Vergil said something about some kind of power in this town but I don't have any idea what that power could be."

"So what are we supposed to do?" Hezen asked.

"I'll go out tomorrow and try to find out what's going on," Pena answered. "Until then, you have to worry about harboring your child _and_ Dante's human side while we look for that sword."

"Alright. What was wrong with me when Dante was fighting? It was hard to move and you kept telling me to concentrate." Hezen said with a nod. "What was that about?"

Pena sighed. "When Dante fights it goes against your soul. That burning feeling is your soul burning from the sensation of giving yourself up to Dante," Pena explained. "If you concentrate on your _physical_ body then it gives Dante enough power to access his true power."

Hezen rubbed her forehead as she gave a deep sigh. "I can handle that. But what was it that I heard come from you? Didn't you say that you were a guardian angel?"

The food in Dante's mouth began to push outwards from the shock but he swallowed it instead. "What?" he asked.

Pena closed his eyes. "It's true. I'm not a demon like I said before…I'm a guardian angel. In fact Dante…I'm _your_ guardian angel."

"Then where the hell have you been all this time!?" Dante yelled as he sat forward.

"Look," Pena sat up on his backside, his paws in front of him, "there are reasons for why I haven't been around you. A lot of things have happened…"

Dante laughed sarcastically. "_Like_?"

Pena narrowed his eyes. "Dante, you don't understand. You don't know how hard I—"

"Ya know what?" Dante placed his food down onto the floor and stood. "I'm going downtown to finish a few missions done. Save my food for me will ya?"

Hezen bobbed her head again and closed her eyes. "Don't worry about it."

"But what about the blood—"

Before Pena could finish, Dante raised his hand, cutting him off. "Don't worry," Dante insisted. "I'm not gonna take any missions that require me lifting more then my pinky. I'll catch you two later."

With that said and done, Dante walked into Hezen room where he put on his normal red coat and black pants. He placed Rebellion on his back, shoved Ebony and Ivory into their holsters, and tucked his amulet away.

Dante moved to the front door. "Bye!"

"Be careful," Hezen said.

Dante closed the door behind himself. The sound of the door locking behind Dante sent an empty echo through the apartment that sent chills down Hezen and Pena's spines. Dante had really taken off, even after everything Pena had told him. Dammit didn't Dante ever listen to anything _anyone _told him?

Hezen coughed. "Did you get the book?" she asked.

"Yes." Pena nodded. "Do you think you know enough Latin to read it?"

Hezen crossed her legs. "We'll see. If I can't read it all, I'm willing to do research no matter how long it takes."

Pena jumped off of the couch and traveled over to the dining room. He dug through a large pile of clothing that belonged to Dante and Hezen until he picked out a thick, old, leather bound book he had hidden away from the demon. He dragged it over to where Hezen was sitting, and pushed it against her leg.

"This is really it?" she asked in awe as he picked up the book.

"Yes. The Book of the Dammed," Pena whispered.

Her hands ran over the cover of the book and she felt how delicate the cover felt, even with its hard covering. The thickness of the book along with the hardbound leather backing made the book heavy; how Pena had carried it from wherever he had taken it from was beyond her imagination. Forgetting about everything else, Hezen opened the book. The words on the front page were strange at first, but she could make out a few words.

"The," Hezen narrowed her eyes, "Legend of Sparda."

xXx

As Dante walked down the dark streets, he found himself traveling down towards the Hilton hotel. He stopped in front of the revolving doors but he could go no further. What if Evern were in there? What if Evern were fighting and waiting for Dante to arrive once more? Could Dante kill such a man? Of course Dante could kill Evern…but did he want to?

"Dammit," Dante whispered.

The hotel had yellow caution tape all over the revolving doors from the incident that had happened earlier. Dante thought that everything would have been cleared up by now; after all it happened four days ago. Before Dante could stop himself, his curiosity got the better of him; pushed the yellow tape up, and walked into the hotel. He pushed the revolving doors until he forced his way through to the lobby he had fought in once before.

Nothing moved within the hotel, everyone who had been in it before had been evacuated because of the fight. Blood stains still sat on the carpet underneath his feet. He kicked the blood stain, and kept moving through the hotel until he reached the front desk.

How could Evern be that monster Dante had fought earlier? Dante would be able to see Evern as a _human_ not as that beast that randomly attacked him…right? What the hell was going on around here?

"Sure got me stumped," Dante whispered.

Figuring that it wasn't worth worrying about at the current moment, Dante left the hotel and began walking down to the bar that Enzo called his second home.

xXx

An hour had passed since Dante had left the apartment, and Hezen, instead of being in the living room, now laid down in her bed with Pena lying on top of her pillow still in cat form. She had read as much as she could of the book Pena had brought her and left the rest to be translated later.

"You know," Hezen began in a low tone, "I go to court in a week."

Pena closed his eyes. He hated hearing about this. "I know," he whispered. "Have you met with your lawyer lately?"

"Yes," Hezen said as she too closed her eyes. "He thinks that this will be an open and shut case, after all I don't have a motive or anything like that. I think they just want to question me in a court room to see if I confess anything out of the ordinary."

"What are you going to tell them?"

"Same story I've been using. It had to be a robbery by a man I didn't know. He killed Evern for the money and left when I came around looking for Evern," Hezen said. "Simple as that."

Pena rolled over onto his back, bored. "When are you going to bury Evern?"

"After the case settles down." Hezen gripped the sheets underneath her. "They still have his body…so I can't do it any sooner then after the hearing."

_His body?_ Pena thought. _Wait…if his body is still in the morgue how did Dante see him? Could it be…no. Dante said that Evern had a body but…how? _

The sound of sniffling broke Pena's thoughts. He looked down towards Hezen but before he could get a clear look at her face, she stood and walked out of the room. He started to get up to go after her but stopped.

"I should leave her alone for a while," Pena whispered to himself. "I always forget that she's in mourning."

xXx

Hezen strolled through her living room and out onto the balcony. She hunched over the edge of the balcony, taking care of her right arm, and looked down towards the street filled with people who were going out to the nearby clubs and late night parties. The heat from the sun made the day hot and humid and that heat traveled into the late night but that was the last thing on Hezen's mind.

"Evern," she whimpered. "I'll bury you…don't worry."

As Hezen lost herself within her thoughts, Pena walked up behind her. He watched his master cry, but knew that he had to tell her something important. He wanted for her to stop crying, and coughed to get her attention.

"Hezen?" Pena asked.

She sniffled. "What?"

Pena took a large breath inwards. "There's something…I need to tell you. About this bond you have with Dante now…there's something Dante can do that _can_ kill you."

Hezen perked, and turned around to the cat. Pena wasn't facing her; instead his attention remained at an empty chair that sat in the corner. Silence came between the two of them as a hot, humid wind blew.

xXx

The minute Dante walked into Enzo's favorite bar, the heat hit him. The stench of sweaty men entered Dante's nose; he crinkled his nose a bit, he thought he would be used to something like this by now, this place never smelled good. Dante stepped forward, to where Enzo sat and took a seat down beside him.

"Hey Dante!" Enzo said with his usual blush across his face. "I haven't seen you around here lately. You alright?"

"It's only been a few days," Dante answered as the barkeep placed a beer down in front of him. "Did you wire the money to my account?"

Enzo laughed. "_That_'_s_ the problem! See you got rid of that monster in the hotel but it _killed_ the guy who was supposed to give me my money!"

"_Our_ money," Dante corrected. "So now what the hell am I supposed to do? Rent for my shop is comin' up soon."

"That's why," Enzo leaned over onto Dante, the stench of beer traveled into Dante's nose, "I picked up another mission for you!"

Dante took a sip from his beer. "Hurry up and spill then!"

Enzo chugged the rest of his beer. "There's a business buildin' down by the waterfront where that guy who was supposed to give us the money worked. The money is supposed to be in his office. I've got his office key so you've just gotta go down there and get it."

"Good," Dante said. "When do you want me to head down there?"

"An hour," Enzo said with a careless shrug. "The place opens at nine in the morning and it's eleven so you've got plenty of time."

"Finally I get some time to sit down and drink."

The reflection of his beer mug showed Dante's grin as small bubble rose up in the golden drink that sat in front of him. Tonight would be good.

xXx

After having three more beers, Dante left the bar and walked down to the waterfront. He had gotten the address and office number of the business from Enzo right before he left with alcohol running through his system. Once he arrived at the waterfront, he strolled along the side of a dock where people kept their boats during the night, and made a pit stop at a large pier.

The pier was made out of concrete with wooden planks leading onto the cement from the sidewalk. The gray concrete stretched out hundreds of feet into the dark water with two barriers on both sides and a large middle for people to walk on. Streetlights had been placed thirty feet within one another on either side of the pier with the third one in on the right blinking on and off in the dark night.

"Kino!" Dante called out into the night. "Kino are you here?"

"Don't yell Dante!" an old voice said from the shadows.

A man stepped out from behind the broken streetlight with a thick burning cigar clinging to his lower lip. His coarse black hair leaked out through the blank beanie he wore wearing as his tired brown eyes looked back at Dante. Deep wrinkles littered his dark brown skin around his forehead, underneath his eyes, and around the corners of his mouth. He wore a thick dark green coat that made him appear to be short, black jeans, and thick brown boots.

"Hey Kino," Dante said with a grin. "I haven't seen you lately, where ya been?"

"Crab fishing," he answered in his guff voice. "Where have _you_ been Mijo?"

Dante shrugged. "Around. A lot of stuff's been goin' on."

Kino shook his head. "You wanna help me bring up the crabs Mijo? I'll let you take one home."

"Sure."

Dante and Kino walked over to the right side of the pier and over to a rope that dangled over the edge down into the water underneath them. Kino pointed to the rope, Dante grabbed it, Kino wrapped his hands around the rope in front of Dante's hands, and together they pulled. The rope came up with a small metal cage attached at the end of it that had ten crabs within its metal bars.

"Damn you got a lot!" Dante groaned as he continued to pull the rope back. "Whadda gonna do with all of it?"

"Sell it," Kino said as he bit down on his cigar.

After pulling for a few more minutes, the cage came over the edge of the pier and fell onto the ground. Kino groaned, placed his hands on his hips, and bent backwards a bit until something cracked.

"Thanks," Kino said. "This job is getting harder and harder everyday."

"No big deal." Dante waved his right hand, dismissing Kino's comment. "Just drop my crab off at my shop alright?"

"Si." Kino nodded his head. "Where are you headin' out to?"

"I've got a little business to take care of," Dante said with his trademark grin. "You gonna be alright out here by yourself?"

Kino chuckled. "Mijo, you'd better worry about yourself. It's too dangerous for kid, no matter his strength, to be out here this time of night."

"And it ain't good for an old man either." Dante reached out and patted Kino on the back. "I'll see you around Ab-abl…"

Dante paused as he tried to remember how to pronounce the word Kino had taught him a while back ago. He searched his mind for a voice saying the word but before he could remember, Kino laughed.

"You forgot again didn't you?" Kino asked. "It's Abuleo."

"Riiight." Dante turned his back on the older man. "Take care Abuleo!"

"Take care Mijo."

Dante stepped away from the old man with a smile crossing his face. It was always nice to meet up with Kino, a man Dante had known for six years now. Kino was a homeless man; Dante had no idea where Kino slept or ate during the day. Dante once thought about letting Kino sleep at his shop, but remembered the kind of people that came to his shop and decided against it.

Their meeting had been an accident; Dante, being new the city and to his new adoptive Mother, had stolen something from a store and for once, had gotten caught. Fearing what his adoptive Mother would think, Dante ran from the store. The manager chased him down until he slammed into Kino who then took the blame for Dante stealing. The manager cursed Dante and Kino and then left for there wasn't much the manager _could_ do to a homeless man and a nameless brat.

Why Kino had taken the blame that day was something he had never explained but it was also something Dante had never asked. From that day forward they formed a small, strange friendship that came with short rare visits. But what confused the hell out of Dante was when Kino took Dante out for a small dinner the night Dante finished high school. Why would a homeless person with no money collect money for someone _else_ and take them out to dinner?

Through his thoughts of Kino, Dante had traveled to the business where his money was supposed to be. He stopped in front of the forty story building, and followed the floors up until he saw the top story.

"Wow," Dante said. "This is a nice place! What the hell did this guy do?"

Without wasting another minute Dante stepped up to the front door. He looked around the doorway to see if there was some kind of lock to break when the two doors slid wide open.

"Huh." Dante blinked. "Someone must _want_ me to come in!"

Dante scrolled into the building, and right into a large room with only a desk. He began to memorize the room in case of a fight and found how boring this one room was. It was too big, and far too empty for Dante; there was no where to hide if he had to recover from taking any kind of damage which meant that when he fought in here he could not get hurt.

The room had a blue marble floor, an open door to the right of the desk, and ten windows lined up around the outside of the room.

Dante moved his attention to the other open door. "I guess that's my pick!" he said to himself.

His boots clanked against the marble as Dante walked over to the open door but before he walked through the door, he decided to look through the desk. He opened one of the drawers on the desk and began digging through it for anything such as a key card when his ears picked up on the sound of someone walking.

_Dammit._S He grabbed Ebony out of her holster and pointed it to the open door beside him.

Minutes flew by while the stepping noise became louder and louder as the person neared the door. Finally, after countless minutes the man who had taken Dante's human side, Wellon, emerged from the door with his sword in hand. Wellon turned when he heard Dante's breathing, and smiled.

"Hello Dante!" Wellon said. "I've been waiting for you to show up!"

"What are _you_ doing here?" Dante hissed.

"I'm here to protect my Point!"

"Point?"

Wellon moved his sword down until it touched the end of Ebony. "You'll understand when you're dead," he said. "I'm Wellon the seventh Dream member."

* * *

R&R please! 


	14. Washing it Away

Thanks to **XAirAngelX** for reviewing! Sorry I haven't been able to answer the review through replies, I've been really ill but I'll be able to do it now. Anyways,

Enjoy!

* * *

"You'll understand when you're dead," he said. "I'm Wellon the seventh Dream member."

Dante smiled. "I don't care what 'team' you're on, I'm still going to kill you."

"_We'll have to find the sword's opposite partner."_

Dante's eyes moved to the sword touching his gun. That'd better be the right sword or I'm gonna be pissed. It doesn't look like the same sword from before.

Wellon jumped back away from Dante, as Dante did the same. They shot glares towards one another, and then ran to the right. Dante unleashed Ebony onto Wellon, but Wellon managed to dodge all of the bullets using his legs and sword. When they reached the other side of the room, they pushed themselves away from the wall and towards one another.

"This is my Point," Wellon said as they neared each other. "This is where my power reaches its peak!"

"Then why," Dante's gun clashed against Wellon's sword, "are you so damn weak?"

Dante jumped away from Wellon once more and brought Rebellion out into the fight. He aimed the tip of his sword towards Wellon and charged forward with a grin across his face. The tip of the Rebellion cut Wellon's right cheek wide open.

This, as much as Dante pretended to think of it being annoying on the outside, was the thing he loved. He loved fighting and pushing his body as hard as he could while keeping his usual confidence up. He was not going to lose this time, Dante was going to push and push without spilling blood, which just happened to be a new limit he loved. Deep within the idea of never letting his blood spill pumped the adrenaline through his body at a quicker rate.

"Dammit," Wellon hissed as he stepped backwards, away from Dante. "Why are you out fighting by yourself? Where's Major?"

"Major?" Dante repeated.

"The human who holds _your_ human side!" Wellon yelled as a small smile crossed his face. "What's her first name again?"

"What do _you_ care?" Dante growled.

"You'll see."

Wellon ran towards Dante once more and as Dante prepared to defend himself, Wellon jumped into the air and landed behind him. As the demi-demon began to turn around, Wellon moved his sword and cut Dante on the back. It was a shallow cut that tore through his red coat to his back but it was enough to annoy the half demon.

"Dammit," Dante hissed.

Dante swung Rebellion behind him as he turned around but just missed Wellon as he jumped up into the air. Dante aimed his guns towards the green haired man and began to shoot where the other man was going to land. Wellon landed on the ground in a dust cloud of bullets and damaged concrete.

"Got ya," Dante whispered.

The bullets hit the concrete underneath Wellon's legs, flew by his face but not one bullet hit his flesh. The white haired half demon removed his fingers from the triggers of his guns to see if he had done any damage. When the dust cleared, Wellon stood in the middle of the room with a smile across his face.

"What's your human's name?" Wellon asked.

Dante blinked, confused. This delay in the fight began to get under Dante's skin. "What does it matter?" he asked as he aimed his guns for his enemy's body.

"Just," Wellon shifted his weight to the right side, "tell me your human's full name."

"Why the hell should I?" Dante ignored the small stinging pain in his back the best he could but it was starting to annoy him.

"I wanna know whose name you're calling out when you die," Wellon said. "Whether it's your human's name, or your _Mother's_."

Dante narrowed his eyes towards Wellon. "_Her_ name is Hezen Major," he answered. "And I'm not going to be calling out any name!"

Dante kicked off of the floor and began to run towards Wellon when he felt a burning sensation around his neck. He tried his best to ignore it but the more he did, the hotter the burning grew. Dante grew close to Wellon but instead of moving, Wellon stood still with his grin still on his face.

"Damn you!" Dante yelled.

The white haired man switched from his guns to his sword as he neared Wellon. Dante brought Rebellion up, gathering strength, and began to bring it down to slash Wellon across the chest when he felt something cold wrap around his neck. Suddenly, the half demon could no longer run forward and he stopped just inches away from Wellon, unable to cut him with Rebellion.

"What," Dante gritted his teeth, "the hell?"

Wellon began laughing. Dante narrowed his eyes towards the strange man and saw Wellon pointing to his neck with a grin across his face. Dante followed the Dream member's finger and glanced downwards to see a rusted metal chain coming from his neck.

"W-What the hell?" Dante hissed.

"I hope you rot in Hell!"

Dante moved his attention back to where Wellon had been standing but could not find Wellon. Had the evil bastard disappear? The white haired boy began looking in all directions but he couldn't find the other man _anywhere_.

"Dammit," Dante whispered.

"Up here kid!"

The devil hunter followed the sound of Wellon's voice and found Wellon standing upside down on the ceiling with his sword aimed down at him. A small smile crossed Dante's face as he raised Ebony towards the man on the ceiling but when Dante had Wellon within his sights Wellon's swords multiplied until they covered the entire ceiling.

"What…the hell?" Dante wondered out loud.

"Like I said," Wellon grinned, "I hope you rot in Hell."

The swords dropped down from the ceiling in rows, starting the row closest to the front door. This gave Dante enough time to run but to where? Dante scanned the room and spotted the door Wellon had come out of before the fight began; it was his only chance at surviving without spilling blood.

With his plan in mind, Dante kicked off of the ground and sprinted to the door. The swords continued to fall row after row the closer Dante came to the opposite door. But then, unexpectedly, a row _right behind_ him fell. The tip of the one of the swords penetrated a link on the chain around Dante's neck and brought the demon hunter down to the ground with a loud grunt.

"Die bastard!" Wellon screamed.

A pain from being pulled back ran through Dante's neck and down his spine in heavy waves. With the pain in mind and the knowledge of greater pain on the way, Dante grabbed both of his guns and pointed them up towards the ceiling. The swords above him released and began coming towards him at a high rate of speed. He released hundreds of bullets up towards the falling swords and forced the swords to lose all of their momentum. Without their momentum, the swords dropped harmlessly down to the ground around Dante.

Wellon's hands formed fists. "Damn you!" he screamed. "I'll kill you!!"

Dante ignored Wellon's screaming and looked up to see the sword that had brought his chain down to the ground. He fired his guns towards the sword and forced it out of the ground. Now that he was free, Dante stood and ran through the door Wellon had emerged from. He leaned against the doorway to catch his breath and put Rebellion in the sheath that hung on his jacket.

"Shit," Dante whispered between panting.

His blue eyes searched the room for somewhere to go or something to use against Wellon when he spotted a bright white crystal in the middle of the room. Dante cocked an eyebrow at the strange light but instead of walking over to it, Dante fired a barrage of bullets at it.

_Shoot first, ask questions later._ Dante told himself. _This better work._

The bullets hit the white crystal and shattered it into a thousand small pieces. The fragments fell to the ground and the chain around Dante's neck disappeared without a second thought.

"DANTE!!" Wellon screamed.

Dante, now free to move around, turned the corner with both guns pointed out to see Wellon on the floor with a man standing over him, his back to Dante. But before he could fire at the _both_ of them, the new man shoved his thin sword through Wellon's chest.

"Lore," Wellon choked back his blood and vomit, "damn you."

"Weak bastard," the new man, Lore, said in a rough voice. "You are no longer needed."

Lore withdrew his sword from Wellon and turned around to face Dante, his sword still in his right hand. Wellon squirmed around in pain for a few seconds, his legs kicking out and his hands touching the hole in his chest when suddenly his body dissolved into a pile of sand.

Dante moved his eyes away from the sand and towards Lore. Lore was _much_ taller then the silver haired boy was by about a foot or so. His dark blue hair fell beside his face in a thin curtain with the rest pulled back in a small ponytail. His blue eyes glared towards Dante in both disgust and pity. Covering his body was a thick black trench coat that hid every other article of clothing except for his black boots.

"Dante…Son of Sparda," Lore said. "We, the Dreamers, have been waiting for you to mature."

Dante knew right away that this man had to be the 'smart' one out of the group of evil villains. After all, only the smart villains came and spoke in such a manner and revealed plans to their enemies.

"Dreamers?" Dante repeated with a sarcastic laugh. "Call yourselves whatever you want you still annoy the hell outta me."

Lore pouted his lower lip. "I see," he coughed, "thank you for ridding us of Wellon, he was starting to annoy me. Now if you would kindly come with me we can destroy what is left of your incomplete soul."

"Kiss my ass!"

Dante fired his guns towards Lore but the bullets just went right through the strange man. That didn't stop Dante from firing; he just unloaded as much as he could into Lore, then drew Rebellion and charged at him. He yelled out as he slashed Rebellion across Lore's chest but once again his weapon went right through Lore.

Lore smiled. "What a waste of time."

Dante landed on the ground beside Lore and stood. He put Rebellion back into its sheath and placed his hands on his hips.

"What the hell is going on around here?" Dante asked. "I don't wanna sit here all night and pull this crap."

Lore closed his eyes. "It is simple Dante; you cannot fight me outside of my Point for I am immortal. All of the Dreamers are immortal unless they are in their Points."

Dante kicked his legs out carelessly and began walking towards the entrance. "Look, I don't want to hear all of this crap," he said. "If you don't have anythin' interesting to say, then I'm leaving."

"You must fight all of us Dante," Lore continued, "or you and Hezen will die."

Dante stopped in his tracks and turned around. "What?"

"I am supposed to tell you of my mission," Lore turned to Dante, "we will murder you and Hezen if you do not fight all four remaining Dream members at their Points."

"Huh." Dante turned back around to face the door, his boots made a squeaking noise when he turned on the end of his boots. "I don't think you could carry out a threat like that but do what you _think_ you can do. I'll kill all six of you without even—"

Lore's sword came through the middle of Dante's throat. The end of the sword pushed its way through the muscles and trachea until it stood right beneath his chin. Blood spilled down from Dante's neck, down his chest and waist in a warm waterfall. Lore grabbed the devil hunter's right shoulder and moved his mouth beside his ear.

"I will _kill _you," Lore whispered. "You will not see it coming, and neither will _she_."

Dante moved his hand up to his neck to remove the sword but when his fingers touched his neck, he felt nothing. He blinked, confused at what he had just seen. After touching the area where the sword had appeared to go through, Dante realized that the sword was no longer in his neck, nor had it ever been in his neck.

The tips of his fingers began to burn as his stomach knotted and adrenaline pumped through his body. This _had_ to be a deep rage that seemed to erupt from the middle of Dante's stomach. But this was a rage that he didn't understand. This rage was something he had never experienced before. Where had it come from? What was it for? Was it because he was scared?

Scared? No! Dante got never _scared_. The words Dante and the world scared didn't go together in the same sentence. Then what was the motivation behind his new rage? Then, in the middle of his burning rage, he knew. He was _worried_ about something happening to Hezen.

How could he ever allow himself to become so worried about another person?

"I cannot hurt you in another Dream member's Point," Lore said from behind Dante. "But I can screw around with you. Meet me in Falcon Tower in a week to fight me. If you are more then a day late I will kill her, then you."

"A week from tonight?" Dante asked. He hated giving into the 'villains'.

"Correct."

"Fine."

Dante could _feel_ Lore grinning. "Very good," Lore said. "I'll see you then, Dante Son of Sparda."

A cold chill ran through the small room and seemed to swirl around Dante. Dante closed his eyes for a long minute but when he opened his eyes, he saw that the building he had been standing and fighting in…was gone. Nothing remained of the building, just a pile of sand beside him where Wellon had once been.

"What the hell?" Dante asked as he looked around.

He stood in the middle of an empty lot with hundreds of desks, thousands of office chairs, millions of papers, and everything else an office would need scattered all over the dirt floor. Dante looked at all of things on the floor and began to walk out of the lot when he remembered that he _still_ had to look for the money he had earned from his earlier missions.

"Goddammit," he hissed.

This was going to take a while.

xXx

After an hour and a half of searching through desks, Dante found the desk with the money he had been promised. He snatched the money, stuffed it into his pocket, and began walking back to the bar. On the way to the bar, Dante found a clock and discovered that it was almost three in the morning. He knew Enzo would be awake so he hurried over to the bar and found Enzo sitting where he had been before with _another_ beer in front of him.

"Enzo!" Dante said.

Enzo turned around with a bright red face. "Oi Dante! Did ya get the money?"

"Hell yeah. You doubted me?" Dante asked as he came over to the bar.

Enzo cracked a smile. "I would ever doubt you Dante?"

Dante walked over to the bar and sat down beside Enzo. They chatted with one another for two hours about work, life, and little things that annoyed the both of them. Dante never once brought up Hezen and he was happy that Enzo was too drunk to remember or bring up the subject of Hezen. Around five in the morning, the two split the money, and Dante left the bar with a light blush on his face and his pocket full of money. He was right, tonight had been good.

xXx

Dante walked to his shop to find a black bag on the steps. He kicked it, found it harmless, and opened it to see a crab inside of it. Kino, being the honest man he was, had fulfilled his promise. Dante grinned, closed the bag, and walked into his shop with the crab in hand to make sure everything was in order. Everything was still there so Dante left the shop and began traveling back to Hezen's apartment.

Lore stayed on his mind. Fighting the Dream Members at their points didn't bother Dante; the threats against Hezen's life bothered him. As Dante thought about fighting Lore, he figured that he wouldn't need Hezen there to fight with him. He didn't need to her when he fought Wellon, why would he need her there to fight Lore?

_She can stay home then._ Dante thought as he strolled down the streets. _I can handle this on my own._

A strong confidence began to rise up within Dante as a smile crossed his face. He _knew_ that he could handle fighting Lore; there wasn't a need or desire to get Hezen involved in anything. In fact the more he thought about it, the more he knew that Hezen was too involved in his problems as it already was. Letting her stay at home while he ran out to fight Lore and the rest of the Dream members was something Dante could handle on his own.

xXx

The sun had just touched the bottom of the sky, creating a purple and pink coloring to flood the atmosphere when Dante walked into Hezen's apartment. He closed the door slowly, trying to be careful so as not to wake Hezen. He tip toed through the hallway, dropped the crab into the refrigerator, and carefully stepped over to the couch, and began slipping off his clothing until he was in nothing but his pants.

"'Bout time you got home," Pena said.

Dante turned around and spotted the cat sitting in the computer chair, one paw over the other. "Oh so you're up," Dante said. "What's been goin' on?"

"Nothing." Pena laid down in the chair and began to relax. "I've just been waiting for you. Get some sleep Dante."

Dante twitched. Why was Pena being so nice? Dante dismissed the way Pena was acting, and laid down on the couch. He pulled the thick blanket up from the end of the couch and rolled over to face the back of the couch. The money wad in his pocket made it uncomfortable to sleep, even though it made it easier for Dante's mind to relax knowing that the shop would get paid off.

_Stupid._ Dante grinned.

With the money in his pocket, the warm blanket around him, and the comfortable couch underneath him, Dante slipped into a welcomed sleep with the same grin across his face.

xXx

"_Miss. Major it appears that the child is perfectly healthy. Do you wish to know what sex it is?"_

Hezen looked up from the bottom of the bathtub as she thought over what another doctor had told her earlier. She had also been told that her arm was healing well even though it still hurt. Just a few more weeks and her arm would be back to normal. No more then two hours ago Hezen attended an appointment to check up on her unborn child. Everything turned out fine but something still lingered in the back of Hezen's mind that would not rest.

"_There's something…I need to tell you. About this bond you have with Dante now…there's something Dante can do that can kill you."_

The bathwater surrounding Hezen remained still as collections of bubbles danced around her naked body. Her injured arm hung at her side, sore from the injury to the muscles there. Though it hurt, Hezen remained thankful that it hadn't been placed in a cast, after all she couldn't have a cast on her upper arm without casting her entire upper body so she kept it in a sling instead.

She brought her legs up to her chest, wrapped her left arm around her knees, and placed her chin on the top of her knees. The ponytail she had placed her hair in to keep it from becoming wet fell against the back of her head.

"_Evern?"_

_He doesn't remember._ Hezen shook her head back and forth. _Vergil doesn't remember Evern at all…how could he? He's the bastard that took his fucking life! Dammit!!_

Hezen's hands left her knees and covered her eyes. _Don't cry, don't cry. Don't start crying._ She repeated over and over in her head. _Crying is for the weak, I will not start crying!!_

A burning came to the back of Hezen's eyes. She rubbed her eyes to try and relieve herself of the pain but it failed. She stood out of the now cold water and grabbed the knob in front of her. She pulled the knob outwards and water began to pour out from the sliver showerhead a few inches above her head. It started off cold but soon picked up a bit of heat. The water traveled down from the showerhead and trickled down her body until it hit the collection of water underneath her in a heavy rain.

_Please don't._ Hezen lowered her head. The water seeped in through the outer part of her hair and began to soak into her scalp. _Please don't cry. _

Crying would mean giving into her emotions. Crying meant falling apart. Crying meant being weak…and that was something Hezen never wanted to be. Never again would she be helpless and weak. She couldn't _cry_. Not now, not ever.

Not wanting the tub to overflow, Hezen bent down and pulled up the plug which held the water back. With the plug gone, the water swirled down the drain in a circle and gave a loud gurgle before it disappeared.

"_Evern?"_

"Bastard," Hezen whispered.

"_There's something Dante can do that can kill you."_

Hezen had a child; she couldn't throw her life away. The child within her was the last thing she had of Evern; nothing bad could happen to his child. _Nothing._

"I…don't want—" Hezen's left hand flew up to her mouth. No, she couldn't say something so cold and emotionless about someone like Dante. _Especially_ after everything they had been through.

How could she even _think_ something like that? Hezen wanted this; she wanted Dante to be here with her so she wouldn't be alone. Hezen never wanted Dante to leave because the idea of being alone scared her. What would happen if she was alone again? Hezen couldn't even stomach the idea of waking up and not seeing Dante on the couch.

"Evern," Hezen sunk back down on her knees, "please give me the strength to get through this."

* * *

R&R please! 


	15. Looking into the Water

Thank you to **Hunter of Darkness, S, LittleGirl, Ayabyssinan, Lexraheart**, and **XAirAngelX** for reviewing! I'm sorry it's taken so long to update, many things have been going on and I just haven't been getting much inspiration for this fic. However, I've found it now so don't worry! Please…

Enjoy!

* * *

_"Daaannntee!!" Vergil's squeaky voice called. "Dante hurry up! I'm tired of waiting!!" _

_Vergil stood at the edge of a pool, his toes hanging over the cement edge as he bounced up and down. Dark blue swimming trunks covered his lower half as the bright sun shone down on his greasy, sunblock covered skin. Eva lathered both seven year olds in sun block, a lesson which had been seared into her memory after a small incident where Dante fell asleep out in ninety degree weather and was badly burned all over his chest and face. Never again would the twins go out without sunblock._

_Today the sun sat high in the sky, just as it had the day Dante's skin burned, all the more reason for the sun block. The pool was a community pool, ranging from two feet deep to ten. Ten other parents and children swam around in the blue, refreshing water, screaming and playing with bright colored pool noodles. Umbrella hid mothers, fathers, and girls who didn't want to get their hair wet on the side of the pool as multicolored towels protected them from the hot ground. Eva would be one of those mothers sitting on the sidelines in a minute, as soon as Dante came out of the changing room. _

"_Vergil," Eva said as she walked by, dark green towel in hand. "Dante will only be a few more minutes."_

_Eva, unlike the other females around the pool who dressed to show as much skin as possible, she dressed in a dark blue one piece bathing suit which had a small skirt that covered the upper half of her legs. _

_Vergil watched his mother walk passed all of the other women only to feel his stomach take a sour turn. He hated the women around the pool who wore close to nothing and used heat as an excuse to do so. Vergil didn't understand why a woman would dress such a way when she could dress like his mother, classy and beautiful. If he ever fell in love, or so he told himself, he would choose a classy girl like his mother, not someone who exposed everything physically and mentally._

_Eva found a spot beside the pool and sat down on her towel. "Where is that boy?" She turned her head towards a large changing room. "I hope that he hasn't gotten himself in t—"_

_As Eva spoke, Dante emerged from the white building with black swimming trunks and a purple towel hanging from his right shoulder. His skin glistened in the sun from the sunblock as he ran over to where Vergil stood._

_Vergil took a deep breath in while he focused on the water underneath him. "Daaannt—"_

_Dante sprinted over towards his older twin brother and slammed his palms into Vergil's back. Vergil tipped forward, then backwards as he caught his balance when Dante pushed him again. This time proved too much and Vergil fell into the five feet deep water._

"_Dante!" Eva said with an unusual hint of anger in her voice. "Please be careful."_

_The younger white haired boy turned and shot his Mother a grin, something that would never leave as he grew. "Come on Mom! You know he's alright!"_

_The sound of splashing water and a string of cruse words drew Dante's attention away from his mother and back to the pool. Vergil surfaced, his hair now slicked back as his legs and arms moved underneath him, keeping him from sinking. He glared towards his brother._

"_Thanks," Vergil hissed as he spit out the water that had collected in his mouth. "Now get in already. You've kept me waiting too long."_

_Dante's grin returned. "I'm comin'!"_

_Keeping his promise, Dante leaped into the water. He brought his feet to his chest before he hit the water and locked them with his arms. His eyes shut and he took a deep breath of air in as the anticipation of hitting the cooling water sent excitement through out his body. When the water finally did hit him, it fulfilled every fantasy Dante made in those few seconds of jumping. The water cooled every part of his body and pushed his hair upwards. He fell into a slow, chilled world where he could not see nor hear as well as before. This place was everything it promised and nothing could touch him here._

xXx

"…te!! Dante!"

Dante's eyes shot open. Hezen hovered above him, her glasses slipping off of her face. He blinked, confused when a sudden wave of warmth overtook his body. He groaned out from the sudden rush of heat.

"What?" he asked.

She sighed with relief. "You weren't breathing," she said as she moved her hand away from the side of his face and onto his forehead. "It was like you were holding your breath or something. You've got a bit of a fever, you feeling okay?"

He moved his face towards the back of the couch. "I don't know I just woke up."

Hezen pulled herself away from Dante and stood beside the couch with her left hand on her hip. "I'll ask you again in five minutes." With that, Hezen disappeared into the hallway, most likely, Dante figured, into her room. As he fought off another urge to fall back asleep, Pena jumped up on his stomach in his cat form.

"Somethin' wrong?" Pena asked as he peered over Dante's chin. "You were moving around and groaning."

"Nothing." Dante shook his head. "It was just a dream."

Pena giggled, narrowing his cat eyes towards the half demon. "What kind of _dream_?"

Dante curled his lip. "Not like that."

The cat sighed. "You're boring!" he whined. The cat hopped off of Dante's chest and walked over to the computer chair where he sat down and began cleaning himself with his front right paw. Dante looked over at him for a minute or two, then sat up and ran his fingers through his hair.

"Dammit," he said as another wave of heat engulfed his body. "Not another fever. I just got over being sick!"

"With your human side gone you're more susceptible to getting sick," Pena said between licks. "After all you're a demon in a human world filled with all kinds of strange bacteria."

He glared at the cat and pouted out his bottom lip. "Why didn't you tell me that sooner?"

"Never asked."

This never seemed to end for Dante. Every time he turned around something was wrong or in the process of going wrong. This damn contract thing was starting to become a very sharp torn in his side. He always fought alone with no one hanging onto him and even though he had grown fond of Hezen, he preferred that she didn't get involved with anything more then she had to. When would his human side return to him?

Breaking away from the thoughts of being sick, one thing came to mind: swimming. Damn swimming sounded good to Dante, regardless of the heat coming down from his forehead. Feeling the water around his body, pushing his hair up towards the surface would be perfect now, if only he could find a pool…

Hezen reentered the room. She stopped in her tracks when she saw Dante sitting up, something was definitely wrong: his face had a redness to it and the bags underneath his eyes made it appear that he hadn't gotten a good night's rest in days. She stepped over to him and placed the back of her left hand against his forehead once more, only he didn't pull away this time.

"Yeah," she said in a low, comforting whisper. "You've got a fever again."

He looked up from the computer chair and up towards Hezen. She had changed her outfit, revealing more then he had ever seen. She wore a black tank top which showed the small baby belly she was growing and baggy blue jeans. The sling she had been ordered to wear hung off of her shoulder as her arm crossed over her chest.

"What's with the clothes?" he asked.

She pulled away from him. "The weather is finally starting to pick up. I guess you can't tell the heat from your fever. I'll go get some medicine for you, don't move around too much."

Hezen started walking away from Dante when he reached out and grabbed her wrist, tugging her back. She turned her head back towards him with one eyebrow cocked in confusion.

"Don't bother, I wanna do something else," he said.

"What?"

A smile crossed his face. "You got a pool 'round here?"

She moved her eyes from side-to-side. "Yeeahh. There's an indoor pool on the first floor. What do you—?"

Dante gripped Hezen's left wrist and used her to pull himself up. She grunted from him placing all of his weight on her thin wrist but didn't fight. Dante stumbled a bit and stepped over to the dining room where the bag holding his outfits sat, unzipped. He bent over and dug through it, throwing different articles of clothing all around until he found a pair of lime green swimming trunks.

"You're not going swimming are you?" Hezen placed on hand on her hip. "You're not well enough."

"Yeah I am," Dante answered with a nod.

"But what if you drown?" Hezen said in her usual calm tone.

"That's why you're coming with me." Dante marched by Hezen and into her room where he began changing into his swimming trunks. Hezen sighed, unsure of what to say or do. She could tell Dante was not going to change his mind, no matter what she said or did so what was the point of fighting?

"Just put him in the tub and let him _think_ he's in the pool," Pena offered. "Hey if he kills himself it's his own damn fault."

Hezen rolled her eyes. "Aren't _you_ his guardian angel?"

Pena resumed cleaning his face. "Yeah so?"

There was no point in fighting with a cat. Hezen turned her attention back to her room door and wondered what had come over Dante. He just looked so sick; Hezen couldn't deny anything he wanted, no matter how stupid it seemed. He would be alright…right? Hezen would be watching in case anything happened and she could swim so he would be fine! Besides she knew CPR! Her arm felt good today, she felt that she could use it if she _had _to. Nothing would happen good, bad, or indifferent.

Dante emerged from her room a few minutes later, clad in his bright green swimming trunks and a deep blue towel over his right shoulder. Hezen took in a deep breath of air and confidence and strolled over to him.

"Ready?" she asked.

He nodded. "Come on, I wanna get down there before a bunch of brats arrive. I hate kids."

Hezen turned back. "Don't do anything stupid while we're gone Pena," she said. "I'll knock three times before I open the door."

The cat nodded. "Right, right!"

The black haired girl grabbed her pair of keys while Dante popped open the front door and stepped out. Hezen soon followed, closing and locking the door behind her. Together the two traveled down the stairs in an awkward silence neither one of them wanted to break.

xXx

After going down flight after flight and slipping by rather large crowds of visitors, Dante and Hezen made it to the pool on the first level of the apartment building. Hezen opened the door with a special key and allowed Dante in after her. The room was rather plain looking: the ceiling above was nothing but glass windows as the sides remained a solid light blue color. Benches stood all around the pool for people to side on while a set of wooden bleachers took up the far end of the pool near the deepest eleven foot end. The water reflected a light blue color from the paint at the very bottom. A few children played in the shallow end while a small group of adults hung out in the deeper end.

_I thought for sure there'd be more people here._ Hezen looked over at Dante. "This is it."

"Good." Dante moved his head back and forth, taking in the sight before him.

"But before you go in you've got to do me a favor." Dante turned around to ask Hezen what she meant when she held out her left hand. Three small blue pills rolled down from her palm to her fingers. "Take these."

He frowned. "Why?"

"It'll bring the fever down a bit." She nudged her head in the direction of a water fountain. "I'll watch you _if_ you take the pills."

"Why did you wait 'till _now_ to tell me?" he whined with a roll of his eyes.

"Please just take it," she insisted.

His eyes met hers for a moment and in that moment, Dante made his decision: he would just take the damn pills. The fever _was_ annoying but for some reason, whatever he thought it to be, he didn't want to before. But when he looked into her eyes he saw a woman looking back at him that cared enough to bring him medicine. Hell she could've let him drown and all of her problems would disappear but instead she wanted to take care of him. The _least_ he could do was take the damn pills.

Dante rolled his eyes again to satisfy his ego. "Fine."

Mumbling something, Dante gathered spit in his mouth and dropped the pills in. The blue pills swirled around in the spit and started dissolving when he swallowed it. Hezen stood there, surprised that Dante, in the state he was in, had been able to dry swallow without hurting himself. Once the pills cleared, Dante wiped his mouth and turned towards the pool.

"I'm goin' in," he said. "You watchin'?"

"Yeah, yeah." Hezen nodded. "I won't be too far away."

He turned his head and shot her a tired grin. She giggled a bit as she stepped backwards until the back of her legs hit a concrete bench. Bending down, Hezen sat down on the edge of the bench in case she had to get up and run over to the pool. As Dante stepped into the pool and started swimming from the shallow end to deep end, Hezen watched, her eyes never leaving his toned body.

She leaned her left elbow against her knee as she rested her chin on the palm of her hand. _If I have a son, I want him like Dante…only not so stubborn, hot headed, sarcastic, rude or… _Her thoughts wandered off as the list grew. _Never mind. But having a son kind of like Dante wouldn't be too bad._

The more she thought about it, the more Hezen noticed a slight burning sensation in the middle of her chest. The thoughts of her coming child brought excitement but also this strange burning feeling, what was it? Was it because she knew Evern was never going to see the child? Or was she nervous? The feeling wasn't limited to her thoughts, whenever she looked over at Dante with nothing in mind, the feeling returned. Why?

_Stupid._ Hezen shook her head. She watched as Dante dove under water, flip, and then start swimming back towards the other end. Why in God's name did he want to swim? Was the fever clouded Dante's mind that much? _Dante…please don't get too sick._

xXx

An hour after swimming, Dante decided that he was done. Hezen helped Dante back to the room, his fever pounding away in his head from all of the swimming he had done. Instead of helping, Dante found that the swimming had in fact worsened the fever, even with Hezen's pills. With a heavy, disappointed sigh Hezen became Dante's crunch until they reached her apartment; Dante wrapped his left arm around her neck as she did the same with her left arm. Instead of the lime green swimming trunks, Dante had changed into boxers and a pair of loose fitting jeans at the swimming pool's bathroom.

"Just a bit more," Hezen whispered as Dante stepped onto the platform in front of Hezen's apartment. His foot landed flat, without a problem. "There we go."

"You gotta read me a story later," Dante said with a tired grin. "When you put me in bed, and then check the shop."

Hezen stepped over before the front door, removed her arm from around Dante's neck, and sunk her hand into her pockets, searching for her house keys. "The shop?"

He nodded. "You gotta pay the rent for me…I've got the money in my pants. Just go down there…Enzo should be there."

"Enzo?" Hezen twitched. Memories of a drunk, chubby man came to mind and the rather rude comments he had made about her the night she brought Dante home. She had hoped their first meeting would be their last.

Dante leaned his head against Hezen's. The minute his head touched hers, she felt the warmth from his forehead. Was it really _that _bad? Hezen's eyes widened; she hadn't been expecting it to that warm. "Damn," Hezen said as she kicked open the front door after unlocking it. "That was a bad idea."

With a grunt Hezen dragged Dante inside of the apartment. Pena ran over to the door and closed it behind his master and the white haired demon. Hezen walked into her room and carefully placed Dante down on the bed.

"Relax," she said.

Dante chuckled. He couldn't do anything else even if he wanted to. "Fine."

As Hezen ducked into the bathroom, Dante snuggled into the fluffy white comforter underneath him. He rested his head against the large delicate pillow, releasing a content groan. Pena hopped onto the bed and crawled on top of the pillow where Dante's head lay.

"Comfy," Pena whispered as he snuggled his body into the mounds of hidden down. "I'm goin' back to sleep."

A grin came across Dante's face. "Me too."

Dante closed his eyes and waited for sleep to come, but nothing came. His ears picked up on the sounds of Hezen fuddling around with things in the bathroom and the sound of Pena purring above him. All comforting sounds which would usually _help_ Dante fall asleep but tonight, they made his mind race with thousands of questions: what was Hezen doing? Why was Pena purring? When was the last time Pena had any kind of bath? As his thoughts ate away at him, Hezen came out of the bathroom and searched around the room.

"Hezen," Dante groaned out.

"Hum?"

"Tell me…a story."

She stopped her search and looked over towards the silver haired man. "What kind of story?"

"A fairy tale."

Hezen smiled. "I'm not good at telling fairy tales or any other stories. I'll make one up but it's going to be short."

Dante raised his right hand and moved it back and forth. "Whatever."

The black haired girl strolled over to the bed and sat down on the edge, near Dante's legs. She watched as Dante relaxed into her bed, a satisfied smile across his face, regardless of the redness from his fever. Small beads of water, a mix of sweat and pool water, slid down his forehead, gathering mainly around his mouth and nose.

She took a deep breath in. "A long time ago, there was a small white bunny that lived with a mommy bunny. Now the mommy bunny and baby bunny had a very special saying, whenever the baby bunny cried or got scared of the dark the mommy bunny would hop over to him and say, 'Big bunnies don't cry, only baby rabbits cry!' Seeing that he was a big bunny and not a rabbit, baby bunny would always stop crying." Hezen paused for a moment then took another deep breath inwards. "One day the baby bunny walked over to the mommy bunny and said, 'I'm going to pick some carrots.' The mommy bunny let the baby go and waited by the opening of their burrow to come back. She waited and waited and waited but the baby did not return."

On the back of Dante's eyelids, he saw pictures of the story Hezen told. He saw the mother bunny waiting for her baby to return and found the tone of Hezen's voice comforting. The more and more he listened, the more Hezen's voice disappeared and his Mother's.

"Many lonely years passed and the baby bunny did not return," Hezen continued. "One day, the mommy bunny was collecting carrots in a nearby field when she saw another bunny across the field. She dropped all of the carrots in her paws and ran over to the bunny, knowing that it was her son. She didn't know how she knew, she just _knew _it was her baby. The other bunny didn't run away, instead he stayed and waited as the mommy bunny ran towards him. 'Baby bunny?' the mommy bunny asked. 'Is that you?' The big bunny nodded."

Pena stretched his back legs out on top of Dante's head. Dante raised his left hand and pushed away Pena's thin legs. Hezen stopped telling her story and watched studied Dante. He _had_ to be close to sleep, so she figured that she would wrap up the story before he slipped away from her.

"The mommy bunny jumped at the big bunny and cuddled with him. She started crying as she held her missing baby. The big bunny rubbed back against her with a smile on his face. As the mommy bunny pulled away, the big bunny saw her tears. 'Big bunnies don't cry, only baby rabbits cry,' he said. The mommy bunny fell back into her baby's arms and knew that she was never going to be alone again," Hezen said.

_God I'm horrible at making stories up._ Hezen smiled and stood with a heavy sigh. Dante didn't move, through her story he fell asleep whether it was out of boredom she didn't know.

With her mission completed, Hezen strolled into the living room and dug through Dante's pants until she found the money and a pair of keys. She quickly counted it all out, took the amount of Dante's rent, and left the apartment.

xXx

Driving was a pain with one arm, but Hezen managed. After swift drive from her place to his, Hezen arrived at Dante's shop just as the sun began setting. She hopped over to the front of the shop, unlocked it, and walked in. The door creaked open, sounding as if it came right out of an old horror movie. Hezen ignored the noisy door and stepped into the open area of Dante's shop. An order lingered in the living room, but she couldn't tell what kind of smell it was. As she walked deeper into the shop, she knew the smell: corn chips, lots of corn chips.

_Dante._ Hezen narrowed her eyes as she looked around. _Don't you ever clean up anything?_

As Hezen studied her surroundings and memorized everything in the room, the upstairs wooden door slammed open, and Enzo sprinted out of the room with sweat pouring down his forehead. He panted as he slammed into the black metal railing in front of the door, sending an echo through the quiet office.

"Dante!" he said with a dry voice. "Da…nte?

Hezen turned her head up and spotted Enzo. "No…he's back at—"

Before Hezen could finish, Lore stepped out from Dante's room and kicked Enzo over the railing. Enzo screamed as he fell from the top floor and hit the ground with a loud grunt. Hezen ran over to Enzo and started shaking the chubby man.

"Enzo," she said. "Enzo! Dammit!"

"He's fine," Lore said.

Hezen moved her head up and saw Lore sitting on the railing, his right leg over the left. The hair on the back of her neck stood the minute her eyes landed on him but it wasn't his looks that pumped adrenaline through her body. There was something about this man, something Hezen had never felt before. Her knees wanted to give out from underneath her, but she locked them the best she could so as not to become vulnerable. The ends of her fingers burned as adrenaline gathered there but she did not bent her fingers to rid herself of the feeling. No, she would need every ounce of adrenaline to get away from here.

Lore rolled his eyes as he watched Hezen's reaction. "Hezen Major I presume?"

"Y-yes," she said. Why was she shuttering? Did he scare her _that_ much?

"Good. I am here to ask you to relay a message for me," he said with a frown. "For Dante."

Hezen cocked an eyebrow. "Dante?"

"Yes," he said as he brought his hands together and cracked his fingers. "Dante." His voice dropped an octave when he repeated Dante's name as a smile tugged at the corner of his lips.

* * *

R&R please! 


	16. Name versus Type

Thanks to **Hunter of Darkness, Nowshin,** and **LexraHeart** for reviewing! Sorry for the long wait, this chapter took forever to produce!

Enjoy!

* * *

"W-what do you want with Dante?" Hezen asked as she gulped. For some reason her throat felt dry and she couldn't seem to wet it, no matter how much spit she swallowed.

"A lot," Lore answered with a smirk across his face. "More then you will ever know _human_."

Why the emphases on the word human? Like it was a sin…did it feel like one to him? Hezen wanted to ask more questions to this strange man but before she could think of anything to ask, Enzo let out a low groan. Her eyes left Lore and she ran over to the Italian man's side.

"Enzo?" she asked as she placed her good arm over his neck, feeling for some kind of pulse. "Can you hear me?"

Enzo's eyes fluttered open. "Hey…you're that chick that…Dante lives with…"

Hezen ignored his comment and fell into her doctor personality as her eyes roamed over Enzo's chubby body. "What hurts?"

He chuckled, and opened his mouth as he gasped for air like a dying fish. "Everything."

Hezen's eyes widened. "Damn," she whispered. Everything? What had Lore done to Enzo while they were locked in that bedroom? What could a man like that do to an already injured woman like herself? If he showed no mercy to someone like Enzo, what would he do to her?

What would he do to her child?

Her baby. Hezen _had to _do everything in her power to protect herself and her unborn child. But would that mean leaving Enzo behind if the situation called for it? Would she, a woman who helped people for a living be able to leave an injured man here? Could she be that cold hearted?

Through her thoughts, Enzo's eyelids fluttered and shut. Hezen's eyes widened and she placed her right hand against his face while her heart slammed away. No, no this couldn't be happening! She tapped her hand on the side of his face over and over but the chubby man did not respond.

"Dammit," Hezen muttered. "Enzo! Enzo!!"

With Hezen's eyes locked on Enzo, Lore jumped down from the balcony and landed behind the black haired girl. The sound of his shoes hitting the floor echoed through the empty room but as Hezen turned her head around, Lore grabbed the back of her neck. His fingers dug into the skin there while Hezen held still. There was nothing more she could do…Fear ran through her body, sending every one of her nerves on fire but it didn't seem like enough. She couldn't _move_, she couldn't _think_.

Would it all end here?

Lore increased his grip on Hezen's neck and tossed her backwards without a care. Hezen skidded across the wooden floors until she smacked into the wall on the other side of the room. She screamed as her back met with the wall and as fire traveled down her right shoulder and to her injured arm. The muscles in her arms tightened around the broken bone there and forced the hairline fracture to gird into itself.

"_Crap_," Hezen hissed out in pain.

With the pain still lingering in her arm, Hezen managed to look up where Lore and Enzo once where. Lore still stood in the place he had been before with a long silver sword hanging down from his right hand. Just seeing the shine off of the razor edge sword made adrenaline pump through her body. She could hear her heartbeat in her head but nothing else. Nothing came to mind. _Nothing_.

"Hum." Lore cocked his head and began walking towards Hezen. "You will be my reminder."

"W-what?" Hezen's hands shook.

_Please God._ Hezen watched Lore step over to her, his eyes never leaving hers. _Let me get through this…Please God…_

Lore arrived in front of Hezen and raised his sword. Hezen's eyes left his and watched the sword go higher and higher into the air above Lore's head. The dark haired man grinned and dragged his blade down, cutting the air. Adrenaline pumped through her, even though it had felt like her heart had stopped beating. She had one mission, a mission she could not fail. She hunched forward and wrapped her arms around her stomach as she closed her eyes.

_Let me survive this. _

xXx

Dante jumped out of deep sleep and opened his eyes as wide as he could. Something was wrong…but what? The shock from waking in such a way still lingered in every inch of his body but he could feel it disappearing quickly. He looked around bedroom he had come to know in the past weeks but saw nothing out of place. Pena still sat on the bed, in a dead sleep. He tried inhaling through his nose only to have his congestion prevent any air from getting in his lungs. Sniffling, Dante placed his head back onto the pillow and fell into his deep sleep once more.

xXx

No pain.

Nothing.

Hezen's heartbeat rang through her ears and adrenaline still remained in her blood but other then that, everything felt fine. Had Lore cut all the nerves in Hezen's body or had he snipped her spine? Or was she did? Curious, Hezen peeked through the back of her eyelid and saw Lore's sword pierced through the wall right beside her left ear. The blade faced down at her shoulder and threatened to cut her if she stood. And even though the sword had missed her head, she could feel warm blood tricking down the side of her face.

"Messenger," Lore began in a low tone, "tell Dante of my doings."

Hezen glared up at him. "W-why?"

"Because—"

A scuffling noise caught the two's attention. Lore turned around as Hezen peered around the thin man's body. There, near the front of the door, stood Enzo, his back hunched over and on his tiptoes.

Hezen's eyes watered. "Enzo?"

Hearing his name, Enzo sprinted through the door without a second thought. How could he? Hezen felt her stomach twist as tears cascaded down from her eyes. She was willing to stay and help him but he decided to take off without even _thinking _about her? She was with child! How could he just take off like that?

"Pig," Lore spat, his eyes on the front door. "A bastard child of a gambling male and a promiscuous woman. A babbling fool born without powers," he turned back to Hezen, "almost like you."

She narrowed her eyes again, but she did not know if she was trying to be brave, or push back the tears. "What are you talking about?"

"You do not have any power." Lore reached over and pulled his sword from the wall. A few pieces of the cheap wall fell and hit the ground beneath the both of them. "You are nothing but a human who will fall before the feet of gods."

Her squinted eyes widened as the word echoed through her head. Had he really said such a thing? "Gods?" she repeated.

"Us," Lore answered. "Now collapse before the feet of Dante, a man unworthy of the power he has."

Lore moved his right hand out and snapped his fingers. At the sound, Hezen's eyes rolled to the back of her head, and she fell backwards, against the crumbling wall. Her shoulders slumped and left hand smacked on the hard wooden flooring with a _thump_. A stinging pain ran up her arm both the fallen one and the shattered one. What was this? Oh she wished she could ask: what are you doing? Who are you? What do you want with Dante? But she couldn't…

Then, darkness.

xXx

Dante opened his eyes, and released a wide yawn as he stretched his arms up until his balled fists hit the large headboard. He hissed out a bit when a slight pain ran down his arms, but he quickly dismissed it as another yawn came over him. When he finished his morning movements, the white haired boy sat up and ran his fingers through his strands while his pale blue eyes searched for the clock. But as he touched his scalp, he found a slight heat bubbling underneath his fingers.

_I've_ still_ got a damn fever. _He mentally groaned with a roll of his eyes. _How much longer am I going to have to put up with this crap?_

He growled and continued his adventure to find the clock. There, sitting on the nightstand he found it, big red numbers blinking back at him; 3:23 AM.

"Three in the morning?" he moaned. "Damn."

The devil hunter got to his feet and balanced himself the best he could as his fever pounded away in his head, triggering a pain right behind his eyes. He stumbled out of the bedroom, his loose and baggy pants making his march a bit harder then it usually would be. Though it was hard, Dante managed to make it to the living room, where he saw the appliances off and no sign of Hezen.

"Hezen!" he called while leaning against the wall and lowering his head. How could a simple cold do so much to someone as strong as him? He wasn't weak, and yet an uncomplicated fever interrupted everything so easily.

"You here?"

No answer.

He moved away from the wall, his shoulders slumped. "Crap…"

Blinded by the heat, Dante walked back into Hezen's room and put on a white tank-top, and a heavy black overcoat he found hanging in the closet, most likely something of Evern's. He snatched his precious amulet and strung it around his neck, the metal cooling and soothing against his hot skin. He grabbed Ebony and Ivory out of the bathroom where the leather belt had been set to dry and wrapped them around his waist instead of crisscrossed over his back. As much as he wanted to take Rebellion out of habit, it proved too much of a hassle when he placed it in its sheath. Armed, the young man left the apartment without a word to the sleeping cat.

He had to find Hezen.

xXx

Walking with a clear mind, Dante found, was something he had taken for granted. Traveling with a fever was far harder then with a buzz, and he could only imagine how it looked to the people around him. In all honesty he had no idea where he was going, as long as he managed to stay out of the streets the hunter figured that he was alright. After his exhausting walk, Dante found himself in his old office but still no sign of Hezen or of Enzo.

Now strolling down the waterfront, a wave of dizziness overtook him, and he fell to his knees. "C-crap."

His head spun and his eyes dilated to take in more light, though the headache lingering behind them despised the increase of light. He removed the overcoat from his body and leaned against something hard and cold, something he hoped was a solid wall. Sweat poured down from his hairline, but it didn't bring him any sort of relief.

He smirked. "Doesn't this feel familiar? Now all we need is—"

The sky above _boomed_ and threw down a blanket of freezing rain. Goose bumps rose on Dante's exposed arms but again the outside force did nothing to cool his rising fever. The rain washed away the sweat, replacing it.

Chuckling, the young man looked up. "Thanks…a lot."

"Mijo?"

The half demon lowered his head and saw his old friend Kino standing a few feet in front of him, droplets of rain gathering on is ragged beard. The older man stepped forward, but froze when his hard eyes landed on Dante's half open eyes.

"K-Kino…"

Dante kept his smile as his eyes shut. He had lost the fight against the illness swimming around in his human body, the first fight of many that the young devil hunter would lose in these hard times though he wouldn't accept it. Stubborn, until the very end.

xXx

"—te! D-n-e!"

Pastel blue eyes peaked open to the ceiling of his office. Here again? Feverish warmth dripped down his body, pooling right behind his eyes which triggered another headache. Dante blinked a few times before his conscious mind caught up with him.

"Where am I _now_?" Dante sat up, pressure from his movement made his head throb and rubbed his temples to try and ease the pain. "Don't tell me another pregnant woman with a mental cat has picked me up."

A snarl. "_You're welcome_," Hezen's voice said from the corner of the room.

"Are you alright, Mijo?"

Dante raised his head and found himself lying down on his red couch underneath the stairs of his office. His guns lay on the floor beside his body, along with his bright red jacket. Hezen sat on the love seat connected to the couch, legs crossed and a frown on her face while Kino took a seat in a silver folding chair in front of the young devil hunter.

"What's going on?" Dante asked as he leaned his lower back against the couch's arm. "Where," he cast his eyes towards the woman, "have you been?"

She narrowed her eyes. "Ah something I never thought I'd hear _you _say. I was dropping off your money to Enzo when I was attacked by one of those Dream guys."

Dante sat up, his heart pounding his ribcage. "Dream guys? Which one?"

"Lore," she answered with a slight growl beneath her words. "He wants me to tell you that he threatened to stab me, and that he tossed me against the wall. I could care less about what he said, the he bigger thing I want to know is: How did he know _you_? Are you hiding something from me?"

"Look it was no big deal! I got into a fight with some guy, beat him, and then Lore showed up wanting a fight!" Dante rolled his eyes annoyed. Why was she questioning him like he was some sort of child? She wasn't his mother!

Hezen leaned forward, her frown transforming into a scowl. "So you _are_ hiding something from me?"

He threw his hands into the air and slapped them back down onto his leather pants. "Yeah so what, big deal! Last time I checked I didn't have to report everything I did to you!"

"Dante, Hezen stop," Kino said, finally coming into the conversation. "We have much more to talk about."

"Fine," both Dante and Hezen said as they retreated from one another.

Kino placed his elbows on his knees and rested his chin on his palms. "Dante, what do you know about these Dream members?"

"Dunno." Dante shrugged. "The first guy I fought…Wellon, he said something about a Point and being immortal, and I agreed to fight him in a week."

Kino took in a deep inhale and scratched his tangled beard with his right fingers. "Did he mention anything about being a god?" Hezen nodded her head before the silver haired boy could answer. He, in turn, shook his head. "This is worse then I thought, Mijo."

"What now?" Dante sighed. He knew this all too well, after all he had been dealing with paranormal things since childhood and only recently turned it into a business so he wouldn't end up like Kino, homeless.

The older man suppressed a heavy cough, and then cleared his throat. "Have you ever heard of Sparda?"

He _had_ to chuckle at that. "Yeah, never met 'em though."

"Don't be such an ass, Dante," Hezen barked.

Dante chose ignored that comment, giving Kino the okay to continue. "When Sparda began the fight to separate the human and demon world, Mundus sent seven gods to stop him. One by one Sparda murdered those gods, and sealed them away in Hell when he separated the human and demon world."

"So you think the Dream members are those gods?" Hezen closed her eyes and tucked her good arm under her growing midsection. "How did they get back here?"

"I don't know." Kino sat up, tilting until his back grew flush with the metal chair. "That is something I do not understand, and something you'll have to learn, Dante. In the meantime I say that you head home and break that fever."

Now someone else was going to tell him what to do? "Yeah, yeah." Dante cast his eyes towards the ceiling and noticed just how crooked the fan's blades were. Had they always been like that? Maybe that's why the main room was so hot during the summer…

"Dante!"

The white haired boy flinched at the nastiness his name was drenched in. Peaking over an eye, he saw Hezen glaring over at him with her lower lip pouted out. If it were any other time, he might have found it cute but the anger of being told what to do _again_ finally bubbled over within his stomach.

"Look," he stood and made a slicing motion with his right hand, "_no one_ tells me what to do. No one has for seventeen years, and no one is gonna start. I owe you," he pointed towards the doctor, "something for coming in and throwing things through a loop and I promised to stick around and help you to repay you but that's _it_. Once I've helped you, I'm outta there, alright?"

Kino blinked and his jaw dropped open a bit. "Dante…"

Hezen, however, remained still, her gaze on Dante and arm tucked near her waist but as he looked at her, he realized that he _wanted_ her to get mad. He wanted to see how mad his words would make her and what she would say back. Would she scream, cry, or kick him out?

Would he be free?

Oh, he had gone too far. The little voice in the back of his head screamed at him for his recent thought, cursing and blinding him with facts that his eyes did not see. The demon side of him seemed to take over, and he didn't care. He didn't want to be mad at himself for something he hadn't even _said_ aloud.

But from the look on Hezen's and Kino's faces perhaps it had slipped out. He widened his eyes at them as if asking for an answer, or a reply. The silence tore through him; he just wanted an answer dammit!

"Free?" Hezen replied with a sarcastic chuckle. "You think you're stuck here, with me?"

"Yeah, yeah I do."

She jumped out of her seat and recoiled. "I didn't _ask for this_," she hissed out in a tone Dante had never heard come from her before. "I'm pregnant with a demi-demon while running around with a busted wing all which happened because I took you in that night! I saved your damn life and here I am making sure that you don't die from your Goddamn fever!"

"You didn't ask for this? Why don't you find someone who has and get back to me," the devil hunter spat.

Dante marched away from the group and over to his wooden desk. There, resting on the top of the desk lay his guns, Ebony and Ivory. He grabbed them and then took his damp jacket from the nearby chair. Throwing it around his body, he placed his guns in the holster still wrapped around his hips.

Kino got to his feet. "Where are you going, Dante?"

"I'm _leaving_, gettin' the hell out of here." Dante wiggled into his coat until the creases smoothed out.

"Mijo you can't just—"

"Ya know I thought you would be the last person who would tell me what the hell to do." Grabbing his guns, the half demon approached the front door.

The older Latin man stepped forward with his right hand stretched outwards. "But you have a high fever, it isn't good for you to go out. If you're going to face Lore you can't risk becoming—"

Dante waved his right hand, silencing the older man. "Don't worry about me. I'm headin' out and _maybe_ I'll stop by Hezen's place for a blood transfer thing before the fight. See you later."

Without another word the younger man left the shop, slamming the door behind him. A cold rain packed wind smacked him the moment he stepped out but he ignored it. The breeze moved his white locks as he walked forward, whipping the sides of his head the further he traveled.

He wasn't some animal to be locked up by people who took the role of his dead parents. He had made it before alone, and he could do it again.

* * *

R&R please! 


	17. The Weakest

Thank you to **HotIceRed, soji, Hunter of Darkness, Eric Draven201, Devil Rebel, Demerah**, and **LexraHeart** for reviewing!

* * *

One week had never felt so long before, well not since Dante had been stuck within the walls of high school right before summer break. He hadn't spoken a word to Hezen, Kino, or Pena. Instead of heading back to her apartment, he bounced from bar to hotel, then back again the next day and the next until it became a habit that chanced more into a lifestyle. Enzo hooked him up with two small jobs during the week, but the devils that interfered with that mission were easily taken care of. Whatever left over money he had saved from staying with Hezen was starting to dwindle, and even with the jobs Enzo had been giving him he couldn't keep moving from cheap hotel to hotel.

The only good news was that his fever had died down a great deal, though his nose felt a bit runny at times it was much better then the one-hundred or so fever he had been dealing with for the past week. Did it have anything to do with _not_ being around Hezen?

"It's really coming down today," the bartender said as he cleaned out a glass with a white towel. "You're not heading out in that are you Dante?"

Dante bobbed his head. "Yeah, I've got to check the shop."

Rain trickled down the windows in the front of the bar as the wind blew against the small bar. This was one of Dante's favorite places to be, his home away from home or something like that, he wasn't sure what it was to have a home in the first place. Only a few people came in at such an hour, which gave the demi-demon a place to clear his head away from the whole 'being without his human side' thing.

He had no idea how old the bar was, but he had heard that it had burned down a few years back and, according to the newspapers posted on the wall, the city had lost a great piece of history. The entire place was paneled with wood, why after it had burned down Dante couldn't figure, along with a large bar that stretched over the back of the bar. Ceiling fans halted their movements today, instead the heater pumped out warm air at full blast.

"You've been down lately, kid." The bartender glanced down at the strawberry Sunday the younger man was picking at with a spoon. "My Sundays never last _this_ long in front of you."

"Yeah…well."

The low hum of the jukebox filled the air, and blending with the silence between the two men. Dante tried to pay attention to the song playing over the jukebox, but it was too low for even _his _hearing to pick up on. What was the point of it playing then? Shaking it off, ice blue eyes scanned the empty bar; it was too early for the regular drunks to come in, the rest of the dining area and bar were empty, leaving Dante and the bartender alone. It wasn't too bad for the devil hunter, the last thing he needed was a drunk hitting on him again.

As he scooped up a small amount of ice cream and brought it to his mouth, his mind wandered. The fight with Lore was to take place tonight at Falcon Tower but he wasn't too concerned about it. Sure Lore talked the talk, but as Dante often found with 'villains' they lacked the walk. There would, however, be a schedule that would have to be met before the fight: Dante would have to stop by Hezen's place and cut his hand. No big deal though right? He could handle it! He didn't need anyone helping.

"Hum…that's a bit odd."

He didn't bother to look up from his ice cream, but instead he gave an inward flinch at those oh so simple words. They were such uncomplicated words that when put with others meant nothing, but when said in _that _way never produced a good outcome. "What now?"

The bartender pointed out of the window in front of the shop that opened up to the street. "There's a black cat out standing on the sidewalk. It looks like it's staring at you, kid."

Black cat? Bringing his head up, Dante spun around on his barstool and spotted the cat he knew as Pena sitting on the sidewalk, his bright yellow eyes focused on him. So now his guardian angel was hounding him? In all honesty he had been expecting something like this to happen but he thought it would come earlier in the week. Rolling his pale blue eyes, the white haired boy slammed his palms down on the bar and pushed himself up from his stool.

"I'm going outside alright?" He dug out three dollars from his pocket and placed it on the bar. "Thanks for the food. I'll see you later."

"Take care of yourself, Dante!" the bartender called.

Walking away, Dante raised the collar of Evern's jacket so his ears wouldn't turn a bright read color. A smell drifted up into his nose, one he presumed to be Evern's. Where was he? Was he still that thing he had seen at that hotel? Oh yes, as soon as Lore was taken care of, he had to head back and rid the world of Evern _again_.

The wind smacked him head on when he exited the bar and moved his black jacket and hair to the right. Blending in the crowd, he shifted around until he reached the window where Pena sat. He approached the cat and stuffed his exposed hands into his pockets, doing his best to appear as Dante-like as he could. Pena glanced up at the boy and shook, throwing water everywhere.

"You know I hate being wet, you're lucky I came out here to find you," the cat said. "Hezen wanted me to come and check up on you, if I had my way I never would have come looking."

Dante shrugged, some guardian angel. "Whatever."

Pena closed his eyes and took in a deep breath of freezing air. "Are you going to fight tonight?"

"Yeah."

"What about Hezen?"

"I'll stop by, she's got my sword and good jacket." The boy cast his eyes up towards the raining sky. Droplets bounced off of his nose and dripped down his chin. "Can't the people around us here you?"

The black cat shot a glare at Dante. "No. Only people with supernatural powers and people I _want _to hear can. I want to go with you when you fight Lore."

"What?" The devil hunter removed his hands from his pants. "And what the hell are you going to do for me? You can even stay human for more then eleven minutes! I don't need anybody for anything."

"I know."

Dante blanched, his movements coming to a sudden halt. Pena's simple words tore through his mind and one sentence came to him: someone finally understood. Someone understood that he could take care of himself, like he had been for the past seventeen years. Too bad the only person who felt the way he did was a talking cat, a sarcastic one at that.

With a sigh he looked away from the feline and out into the crowd where a few people stood, watching him with eyebrows raised. "What the hell are you lookin' at?" he hissed.

Surprised at Dante's tone, the staring people moved on, a few muttering about how they weren't going to argue with a crazy drunk who considered a cat a best friend.

Turning away from the large group of people, the white haired young man sighed in irritation. "Anyway, I'll be at Hezen's around five."

"Good, good." Pena nodded. "I'll see you then, Dante."

The feline got to its four feet and took off down the street, not bothering to stop when the traffic blocked his way. He hopped over and under cars, people screamed at him, and the sight made the hunter chuckle. For someone who had claimed to have gotten run over he sure didn't have a fear of cars. The young man watched until Pena was out of view and then turned away to walk the opposite way, towards his shop.

xXx

Dante remained at his shop until five o'clock, when he left to make his way to Hezen's apartment. Rain poured down from the sky much harder then the day before, with winds that measured around twenty miles per hour with a temperature of twenty degrees. What was up with the weather around here? Summer was do in one week, and yet it felt like the entire town was locked in some sort of never-ending winter.

"Damn wind," he muttered as he lifted his collar around his neck once more. Oh how he missed his own jacket, Evern's was much heavier thanks to the thick material but his jacket had a higher collar and more pockets.

Walking around town he eventually made his way over to Hezen's place and up to her apartment. Now what floor was it again? Silently counting the floors, he traveled up to the sixth floor and spotted her door or what he _hoped _was hers. Using the keys she had given to him, Dante popped open the door and entered with a grin on his face.

"Heeeyyyy! I'm home!" he called out, words dipped in sarcasm. "Anybody around?"

His feet sunk into the flush carpet beneath him, each step more comfortable then the last as he came into the empty living room like he had one week ago. With a roll of his eyes Dante departed from the living room and headed into Hezen's bedroom. Politely knocking before entering, the young man crossed into the room and, again, saw nothing.

Dante blew out the air remaining in his lungs. "Where the hell is she?"

The bathroom was his next, and only, guess. No Hezen, but his classic blood red jacket hung from the shower curtain rod, his sword resting against the glass shower door. He changed out of Evern's coat, threw on his own, and placed his sword in it's sheath.

He left her room and ventured back in the hallway. What was he to do? He couldn't just leave and _not_ mix his demon power with the human part of him locked away. But then again he didn't _need_ anybody. He could do this on his own, sure Vergil had banged him up a bit when he fought without his other powers but that was _Vergil_ the older brother who was always better at everything, as much as it annoyed Dante to admit. It had been that way ever since he could remember, and he had denied it for that long as well.

"_Why did Mother bother to protect such a weak thing?_

Oh he'd find him, during or after this stupid adventure he'd find Vergil and show him that he had become the best. It was the least he could do for being the runt of the family.

The white haired man turned on his heel and there he spotted a yellow note clinging to the inside of the door. Rolling his eyes he strolled forward and ripped the sticky note from the door.

"Dante," he read aloud, "I'll meet you on the corner near Falcon Tower if you're late Pena says that he'll head in without you. Hezen." He crumbled the note. "Dammit, Hezen."

He tossed the note to the ground and bolted out of the apartment, only breaking from his run to make sure that he had locked the door.

xXx

The rain pounded on Dante's strong features, chilling the skin there and soon pain started shooting down the nerves there. His breath left him in puffs that resembled clouds, spilling from his mouth every minute as he dashed down the wet streets. Images of streets he knew well flashed before his eyes, directing him where to go and the fastest way there. The closer he came to Falcon Tower, however, the less and less people he saw until he came onto Main Street and saw no one. Why? Main Street _always_ had someone walking around be it a business man returning from late work or a bum.

The rubber soles of his shoes screamed out when he came to a sudden stop, black lines trailing him. "So that must be it."

Starting at the sidewalk, Dante leaned back and followed the side of the building, up and up, forty stories above the ground. Glass windows that appeared blue in the dark covered every few feet along the gray colored walls, but no light shone from within any of them. Had everyone gone home? Wasn't it a bit early?

Unless Lore had murdered everyone.

But where were Hezen and Pena? Had they fallen victim to Lore?

Strolling forward, Dante entered through two glass doors which slid open when he came close enough. A lobby much like the one back at the Hilton greeted his eyes, large, stretching for three hundred or so feet before him. Bright multicolored flowers in every corner and a pool positioned in the middle of the lobby complete with a bubbling hot tub.

"Nice." He grinned as he turned his head side-to-side in awe.

"So there you are," Hezen's voice said.

He didn't bother to follow her voice, instead he cocked his head up and stared at the skylight above. No sign of monsters up there…"Yeah. Pena told you I'd be comin' didn't he?"

"Yes, I was just concerned."

Concerned? Breaking away from the skylight, he turned to the right as Hezen walked over to his side in stiff, harsh movements as if it hurt to travel. Had she pulled her muscles in that conflict with Lore over seven days ago? She released a deep sigh and lowered her head a bit. Growing a bit bored, Dante shifted his weight to his right leg and stuffed his hands in his pockets.

"I'm sorry," she said in a low tone. "I shouldn't have treated you like a child earlier. You can take care of yourself well, and I guess…" she trailed off.

"You guess what?"

She sunk her head down even more, her chin now resting on her chest. "I was afraid of being alone again. You're so independent and you _don't_ need me, and that scares me. I went from having someone depend on me to no one and—"

"Sorry to interrupt but Lore is coming," Pena announced as he hopped down from the same bench Hezen had been sitting on. He approached the group with careful steps, and eyes focused on Dante. "You'd better hurry and cut your hands."

"Right, right."

As Dante reached backwards to snatch his sword out of its sheath, he paused. Rebellion was not one to make a small cut and the risk was far too great, the last thing he needed was to sever Hezen's hand. What was he to do it with? He patted down the sides of his jacket, searching for something, anything, that would provide a service.

"Don't have a knife?" Hezen asked.

Dante shook his head. "Damn I don't have anything. Must've left my switchblade in my other pants." He snickered and straightened up as he looked over at a confused woman.

She cocked an eyebrow. "Was that supposed to be a joke?"

"Uh yeah."

"I don't get it." Hezen turned away from him and cast her eyes on something else.

He shrugged, few people ever got his jokes. "Whatever."

"We'll have to find something." Pena walked away from the two, and began searching around. "This isn't going to be easy if you don't cut your hand!"

Here, again, people were telling him things he already knew. Damn did they think he was stupid or something? He was there, it was _his_ blood and _his_ human side that was missing and dammit he knew what was going on! Growling at his inner thoughts, the white haired boy cracked his fingers to distract himself and shifted around in his boots. Hints of adrenaline spilled into his blood stream though he didn't know why, perhaps the urges of his demon self were getting the best of him.

"So there you are."

The trio turned their heads towards the middle of the room at the sound of _his _voice and found Lore standing a few feet in front of Dante with his dark purple sheath hanging from his hip. He faced the devil hunter, a deep frown enveloped his mouth and eyes set forward with confidence. "I did not think you would be showing up," Lore said with a nod of his head.

"You doubted the great son of Sparda?" Dante chuckled and removed Rebellion from its leather scabbard. "You demons can't seem to make up your mind on what'cha think about me can you?"

Lore lowered his head, chin to his chest. "I am not here to argue with you. Are you prepared to fight?"

"Yeah sure but I wanna know something first." He pointed Rebellion straight at Lore and tilted his head. "Who are the Dreamers and what do they want with me?"

"Hum." Digesting Dante's question, the dark haired man rested his palm on the hilt of his sword. "I will answer one question now Dante, and one if you can manage to defeat me. Pick your words carefully."

The demi-demon pouted his lower lip as thoughts clouded his mind. So many things had happened in the past three weeks, too much to form one decent answer with. What would he do?

"_Shit," Dante whispered between panting._

_His blue eyes searched the room for somewhere to go or something to use against Wellon when he spotted a bright white crystal in the middle of the room. Dante cocked an eyebrow at the strange light but instead of walking over to it, Dante fired a barrage of bullets at it._

_The bullets hit the white crystal and shattered it into a thousand small pieces. The fragments fell to the ground and the chain around Dante's neck disappeared without a second thought._

"_DANTE!!" Wellon screamed._

Slowly a smile came over Dante's face, starting at the right side of his face and moving over. "Where is your crystal thingy?"

Sighing, Lore lifted his right hand and pointed it in the direction of the pool. "It is submerged over there. Get passed me and you can do what you wish with it."

"Great! Let's get this thing started then!"

"Wait!" Pena stepped forward, the fur on his back standing. Was he scared? "You haven't cut open Hezen's hand yet, you—"

"Save it!" Dante gripped Rebellion's hilt. "It'll work out, relax!"

Moving his sword back, he focused his blue eyes forward on the man before him and scanned the area around them, searching for anything he could use to his advantage during the battle. As he surveyed the area, he realized that nothing would truly help him in this battle, the pool proved a bit imagination but nothing more. It was disappointing, but it also meant that there wouldn't be anything for Lore to use as well.

His hands gripped his hilt, sweat coating it and making it a bit harder to get a good grip on the already slick handle. When did it get so damn hot? Sweat gathered at his hairline, a drop or two falling down to his eyebrow where it remained. Was Lore making it hot like Evern had?

Dante charged forward, his boots squeaking against the tile lining the floor. "Bring it on!"

Swinging his sword around, Rebellion met a thin and dented sword. The devil hunter forced as much of his demon strength into his arms, and shoved it against the brittle sword rivaling his and yet the opposite blade did not shatter though it appeared that it would at any second. Why wasn't it breaking?

"That's some sword you got there," Dante said with strain lacing his words. "Gotta secret you wanna share?"

"It is not the sword that brings strength, but the hand that is dealing it." Lore smirked, a facial feature that took Dante by surprise. Never had he seen a smile that looked so wrong and unnatural on someone's face. It was a bit…creepy.

Sparks flew from their blades as they drew away from one another, only to smack into one another a second later. Each took turns sliding away from the starting point; Dante's boots left a trail of black rubber behind, showing his side of the struggle. Every so often Dante threw a glance towards Hezen and Pena, they remained still, their eyes on him and Lore. Why hadn't they left? Hadn't he proved that he could take care of this battle without her blood like he had with Wellon?

"Do you understand what you are getting yourself into?" Lore asked when their weapons met. "Dante, Son of Sparda, you have no idea what I am capable of."

He took his eyes off of the doctor and the cat and placed them back on his enemy. "Why don't you show me then, big guy? I'm dyin' to see it!"

The dark haired warrior chuckled. "Really, Dante? Are you willing to put that human through such a task?"

"Yeah."

The words left his mouth like the bullets Ebony and Ivory would fire. He didn't think about it, the words just spilled out and rang through the air without a care for what or who heard them and a part of Dante didn't _care_. This was _his_ battle, something that could release the demonic urges bouncing around within, and would calm him and his burning heart.

"So be it."

Lore shoved Rebellion away and took a few steps away from the white haired boy. Dante allowed it, and placed his sword on his shoulder as the other man placed his hands at his sides, palms facing him. Dante shifted his weight to his right leg, and brought his right hand to his mouth as a yawn escaped him.

"Not many people see me for who I truly am." Lore's voice changed to one that matched the countless demons Dante had faced. What had happened to the voice of the human he had heard moments ago? Low and menacing with the promise of a battle that would take everything from the hunter.

He couldn't wait.

"Dante don't let him!" Hezen called out. "You can't risk it in your current form, it's not—"

Without looking at her, he waved his hand in her direction, dismissing her. "I can take care of it on my _own_. Just sit back and enjoy the fireworks!"

Hezen gripped her hands into fists. "Dante you moron!" she hissed through clenched teeth.

"Now witness the power of a fallen god!" Lore screamed out as he raised his arms into the air.

Dante remained still as a light red color gathered around Lore's body. Every inch of the strange man began glowing in an ambiance of a cherry-red color, a delicate pink lining the extremities of his body as if he were some kind of cartoon waiting to be inked. The fire truck red filled in the outline the pinkness created, pooling mostly in the middle of his chest. The red mess released a howl, and lit up the entire room with an overpowering light. Dante shielded his eyes with his forearm, pain from the bright light still stinging his pupils.

"What…in God's name is that?" Hezen whispered.

The young swordfighter blinked hard, his eyes still sensitive. "Is what?"

Lowering his arm, Dante spotted the _that_ Hezen had spoken of. In the spot where Lore had once been stood a monster similar to the one he had seen in the Hilton's courtyard. The bulky, fleshy monster inched towards him with thick hands and feet that appeared more like stubs then limbs. Thick veins appeared above the ugly skin, pumping blood through the contracting muscles, some blue, the others red. Two pink eyes stared at Dante, slits for a nose resting inches below and moving every so often.

"So you're finally lookin' right!" Dante chuckled and grabbed Ebony with his left hand. "Let's get this done with!"

"You think I am finished, Dante? Look again," a deep male voice said.

Following the monster's orders, the Son of The Dark Knight blinked and narrowed his eyes. The monster released an earsplitting scream, and the exposed muscle fell away like a cocoon of a butterfly. The form of Lore Dante had come to know emerged from the skin, his skin now matching the muscle flesh he had seen before. Lore looked up, eyes a bright pink color with fangs sticking out from his upper lip. The dark haired man summoned his sword once more, the sword thicker and taller then the weapon he wielded before. A white ribbon hung from the hilt of his sword, and wiggled in the wind he had created during his transformation.

Dante laughed and held Ebony in Lore's direction. "That's a nice trick you got there. Does it come with any perks?"

"Many." Lore's voice echoed after itself. "Son of Sparda, you will not be leaving this Point to venture on. Once I have killed you, I shall take Hezen back to base along with your body and gather my rewards."

"You're forgettin' one important detail, guy!"

The Lore beast bent over, his left arm clinging to his stomach. "And what that be?"

"You gotta kill me first!"

Pulling the trigger, the white haired boy unleashed a barrage of bullets upon his victim. The sounds of the metal ripping through flesh entered his ears as a lullaby would to a sleeping child. His heart raced, adrenaline flowing through him at the same time. Muscles bulged under the siege of his demon tendencies and like shrapnel his demon instincts embedded it within him, not wanting to let go. Urges burned into his muscles, wanting anything blood, gore, and death _something_ that would bring satisfaction to the impulses within him.

"Dante!" Hezen's voice pleaded. "Come back, Dante!"

"_Dante, my son. Relax."_

What? His mother's voice rang through his head and halted his movements even though they insisted on continuing. The demonic aura around him faded away, leaving the remains of a full demon that once called himself a demi-demon. What had he become? His sense and knowledge of battles had all but disappeared, and left him with this overpowering instinct that proved him no good. What was going on? Did he _need_ Hezen or not?

"So you have yet to understand the demon-human contract you have made?"

Snapping from his daze, Dante cast his glance upwards and saw Lore standing on a nearby balcony with his enormous sword aimed out in _his _direction. That damned white strip caught his eye again, but why was it there? It proved as something _Dante_ could use against him, not the other way around.

"Shut up and come down here and fight," Dante answered, his eyes flickering between a icy blue color and blood red. "I ain't comin' up there for you."

The other man gripped the hilt of his weapon and glared down at him, a mixture of emotions dancing over his eyes. "I am Lore, the sixth Dream member and I am here to defeat you, Dante Son of Sparda." Lore smirked again, once more sending shivers down Dante's spine.

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R&R please!


	18. Jasmine

Thank you to **Demerah, AJudgeToCrush, Eric Draven201, Werecat Rei, Devil Rebel,** and **Hunter of Darkness** for reviewing! Sorry this took so long to get up, things were kinda hectic around here for a while!

* * *

_Jasmine:_

"Dante!" Hezen shook her head back and forth, her emotions getting the best of her. "Goddammit kid hurry up and mix your blood with mine! We can't win this if you get hurt!!"

How could he be so damn stupid? Pena had explained it over and over to the two of them and yet there Dante was, trying to prove that he could do this on his own _again_. She _knew _he could fight, he had done it for the past seventeen years but now things were different. Without his human side, he had no idea how to balance his physical powers, let alone take control of what was going on in that little head of his.

Wrapping her good arm around her midsection, Hezen closed her eyes. "Please God," she whispered, "don't let any bad happen. He can't die here, please give him the strength to see this through!"

She had to find something, anything that she could slice her hand open with. Turning in all directions, her eyes desperately searched for a sharp or pointed object but to no avail. For the first time in her twenty-eight years of living her mind went blank, unable to process the simplest thing that could or would get them out of the sticky situation they were in.

"_It is submerged over there. Get passed me and you can do what you wish with it."_

"The Point!"

"What Point?" Pena turned his head up in Hezen's direction.

"Dante asked Lore about some kind of Point. He said it was in the pool." Hezen faced the pool and took a large breath inwards through her nose. "I've got to get rid of it."

"Point, Point," Pena repeated as he brought his right paw to his mouth. "Where have I heard that before? I know it means something important but I just can't remember what it was. Perhaps I—"

The doctor sprinted forward, her eyes locked on the pool that lay not too far away. Her heart slammed within her chest, the fight between Dante and Lore in the back of her mind as she ran. She _had_ to help Dante someway, she just hoped that this was the right way and not something that would screw up everything. But just as she reached the edge of the pool, a red barrier rose that stopped her in her tracks.

"What…the hell?" She pounded on it with her working arm, but it remained as strong as ever. "Come on!" she screamed. "Let me in!"

Pena arrived beside her and stood between her and the barrier. "Stop it, you're going to hurt yourself and that's the last thing we need. Points are the spots where Sparda defeated the seven gods; _you_ aren't going to get in only a descendant of Sparda can enter."

Hezen slammed her hand against the red blockade as water gathered around the corners of her eyes. "Damn I'm so useless!"

And as much as she hated to admit it, she was. Until Dante and her blood met, Hezen was nothing but a bystander. She couldn't call forward the shield that would protect him, the _only_ thing she really _could_ do.

"Wait a minute!" Pena perked and turned towards the entrance. He wasn't going to take off was he? "Hezen, stay here I'll be right back. Scream for me if something goes horribly wrong like I think it will."

Hezen nodded, not being able to find her voice. She watched through fogged vision as the cat bolted away but the sounds of gunfire tore her attention away from Pena's path and she again focused on Dante and the strange looking Lore.

xXx

"I am Lore, the sixth Dream member and I am here to defeat you, Dante Son of Sparda."

Did they all have to introduce themselves like this? Rolling his eyes, Dante pointed Ebony in Lore's direction and began firing. Bullets rang through the air, but as they neared the transformed demon he casually hopped out of the way. Ice blue eyes followed the figure as it dashed around, becoming nothing but a blur in the air. What was happening to his vision?

"Dammit," he muttered.

"Dante watch it!" Hezen called.

What was she talking about? Ebony released another barrage of bullets where the handler had once seen Lore, but they came to a stop when the demon appeared before him with a grin on his face. Ebony fell to the hard, cold ground and Rebellion came up in its place. Again sparks rose as their blades met, Dante's knees buckled underneath the immense pressure the enemy used and started kneeling down as pain shot from his wrists to his elbows.

"I have been waiting years to see the Son of Sparda bowing to me." Lore chuckled and applied more force. "How does it feel, Dante?"

"Bite me!"

Then, without warning, Dante's hands changed to that of a beast. His fingers became claws that gripped his hilt with a new found strength, and a thick dark red armor came over his entire body save for his finger tips and face. Horns made of the same protective covering that hide away his human features curled up near his forehead, and wings sprouted from his back also covered in the shell.

But he didn't _feel_ any different save for the power and adrenaline running through his veins.

"What…" Lore's pink eyes grew wide. "What are you doing?"

Not bothering to give an answer, the newly converted demon raised his left hand and shoved it through Lore's chest without any sort of resistance. Hot blood erupted out from the hole, a large amount splattering backwards onto the nearby wall while a small river sprouted from underneath Dante's hand. Lore groaned and fell forward onto Dante, mouth agape in agony. Spit dribbled down the injured man's mouth, a pale red swirling within the once clear liquid.

"Now I'm gonna take care of your Point." Dante slid his hand out of the still warm body and, without the support, Lore crumbled to the ground in a puddle of molasses-like blood.

xXx

"D-Dante…" Hezen's eyes grew wide behind her glasses as her heart raced at a speed she had never thought possible. The name that left her lips didn't fit the _thing_ she was now looking at, and _thing_ was the only name she could think of calling it. What was going on? Where had Dante gone?

"Hezen!" Pena shouted as he ran down the same path she had moments ago. He arrived at her side and dropped an object he had been holding in his mouth: a box cutter. "Here," he pushed it in her direction, "I found it in the mail room."

She glanced down at the blue box cutter and took a deep breath inwards. What good was it now? "Will it be able to help him now? Look at him!"

The black cat blinked, confused and followed the order from his long time master. His eyes widened as he took in a gasp. "He's in his full demon form!"

"What are we supposed to do?" She nearly choked on the urge to cry. Everything looked so helpless, so dark and she had no idea what to do.

Pena bent down, the fur rising along his spine. Was he scared as well? "Just be careful. He's very unstable right now. Cut your hand just in case he's got an open wound somewhere; the sooner we get your blood mixed with his the better."

"Right." She nodded. Reaching down, Hezen grabbed the box cutter and slid a knob there back until a razor-sharp knife emerged from within the plastic scabbard. How was she going to do this with a broken arm?

"Pena," she tore her eyes away from the box cutter, "I need you to do this for me. I can't do it."

"Yeah, just gimmie a second."

The feline shut his eyes and a great white light came over his entire body. The light molded around his four legged form, and seconds later the brightness started shaping into that of a human. The overwhelming color disappeared when the human form stood up straight, and revealed Pena in his two legged figure.

"Alright!" He spun around, blond hair following, and cut down Hezen's palm. Blood welled at the wound, and Hezen released a pain filled hiss as the blade cut through the first layer of skin. "There!" Pena cheered. "Now we've just got to get Dante to—"

"Hezen…"

She snapped from her pain filled trance and cast her field of vision to where Dante and Lore had once fought. The demon that once held the body of the seventeen year old boy she knew came towards the both of them, and because he lacked the facial features of a human, Hezen could not tell what was on his mind. What was he going to do now? Could he change back? Whether he was conscious or not was a totally different question the brown haired woman wanted to know and yet at the same time refused to acknowledge. What if that wasn't Dante but some strange being that had taken over his body? What if—

"D-Dante?" she stuttered.

Pena jumped forward and extended his arm in front of Hezen. "Careful! We don't know what's happening to his body right now."

But his words fell on deaf ears, Hezen _knew_ who this man was. He was the man who allowed her to cry on his shoulder when she discovered her pregnancy, the man that came after her when she ran away because she didn't want to return home, and the person who cooked a meal for her when he knew how badly she felt. There was no way that he could have lost those memories or his human side. Even though her logical side screamed away at her, reminding her that she in fact was carrying his human side, her heart told her otherwise. Dante _still_ had his human heart, no matter what the old legends said.

"Dante!" she cried as she ran forward. Avoiding Pena's out stretched arm, Hezen dashed in his direction and stood in front of him with a slight smile over her mouth. "Are you alright? Dante?"

"I told you I could do this on my own," the demon said as bolts of electricity and energy glimmered over his body. "You worry too much!"

He was alright.

"Well," she sniffled and wiped a stray tear, "if you didn't act like such a child I wouldn't have anything to worry about!"

"Ich, don't start that again! Look, can we just get back to your apartment and settle this later?"

She cocked an eyebrow. "And how are you going to get back like that, kid?"

"Dunno, I was thinkin'—"

"Dante, Hezen!" Pena shouted at the top of his lungs. "Get down!"

Hezen perked at his words and spun around. Lore, now up and looking rather healthy, ran towards the both of them, his massive sword drawn and aimed at her. Brown eyes grew wide, but for some reason her legs refused to work. It was as if she had rooted herself to the ground against her own wishes, and nothing worked. A white blankness came over her mind, and her instinct faded into the whiteness.

She had a child to protect.

Like a spark in the dark, Hezen placed both arms, even the shattered one, around her stomach and leaned forward. She had to protect the last thing of Evern she had left, even if it meant giving her life for it.

xXx

Dante wrapped his left arm around Hezen's neck and shoulders as Lore's attack came, and shielded her with his right. As much as he tried to take care with the pregnant woman, he felt her wince in arms. With a scream from his enemy, a thick, silver sword tore straight through his demon armor, the tip just inches away from piercing Hezen's forehead. Damn, why had he gotten up? Why couldn't he just accept his defeat?

"You think that's all I have got?" Lore said with a high pitched laugh. "Come demon spawn of Sparda! Fight me!"

"I'll fight you," Dante replied, his cocky human attitude coming through once more. "But leave Hezen out. She doesn't have anything to do with this."

Lore advanced, a grin consuming his mouth. "I only follow requests once my victim has passed away! You have a choice, Dante. Die or the girl does!"

A harsh laugh left Dante. "You get that it means you gotta kill me first right? I don't even think you can do that! Come on then, Lore!"

The demon shoved Lore away and released Hezen, once more taking care in how much force he applied to her. She stumbled out from the hold the once human had her in but she quickly caught herself and sprinted towards Pena. Dante watched out of the corner of his eye as Hezen ran, and smirked inwardly when he saw that she had arrived safely beside the blond haired angel.

_Good. That stupid cat better take care of her._

Spinning back around, Dante rushed towards a still recovering Lore. He raised his sword and with all of his might brought it down upon the man who had challenged him to such a one-sided fight. Lights flew like fireworks up into the air when the Rebellion crashed with another, weaker blade and a high pitched scream echoed through the hotel lobby. The two demons grunted as they pushed into one another and withdrew their weapons only to have them smash together a second later.

When their blades collided again, Lore moved his face inches away from Dante's. "Tired yet, child?"

"Huh." Suddenly Dante's wrists shook under the immense force, and his knees buckled. Muscles began burning as if they had been lit on fire and his breath came in to sore and bruised lungs in shorter sips. "What the hell?"

Glancing back up at the strange man, Dante saw a dangerous leer claiming his mouth. "I am surprised that you have lasted this long after a stab from my sword! I think it is about time you turned back into that disgusting human form of yours."

Then, unlike anything that had happened to Dante, he shifted back into his human appearance. No warning, no funny feeling, nothing. The battle between the swords ended before he could get his bearings back; the enemy's blade entered his stomach deep enough for the tip to peak out of his back. Dante opened his mouth to say anything, something that would express the multiple feelings running through out him, but all that emerged was a gathering of clotting blood.

"Dante!" Hezen screamed.

"How does it feel on the other end, Son of Sparda?" Lore chuckled and dug the hilt of his sword within the wounded demi-demon. "If only the other Dream Members could see me now! I have finally destroyed the last line of Sparda!"

Would this guy ever shut up? Huffing, the white haired boy glared up at the other demon. "I ain't dead yet so quit braggin'."

Lore's laughing halted. "That can be easily arranged!"

Lore ripped sword from within Dante, blood flowing from the open wound like an ocean's wave. And before Dante could react enough to do something, he shut his eyes and they remained closed though he struggled to force them back open. An empty white color absorbed the usual blackness that came when one closed their eyes, and warmth shot down his body. No pain, no thoughts, just a simple pleasure.

xXx

Hezen watched, her brown eyes never able to leave the boy she had come to know over the past few weeks. His blood, the same blood she had cleaned now stained the floor in an ever-growing puddle. She wanted to puke, to empty her stomach and pray that it would be enough to stop this senseless fighting. Yet deep within her heart of hearts she knew that a wish of such magnitude would never come to pass.

"He's going to need help." Pena extended his arm forward. Light gathered in his hand and when the particles came together it formed a thin silver sword. "Stay here and combine you blood with his whenever you get the chance!"

She nodded. "Right."

Lore withdrew his sword and kicked the devil hunter with all of his might. Dante flew into the air and passed both Hezen and Pena, his body hunched over like a puppet whose strings that had been cut. Too horrified to look, the sound of an impact on water rang within her hears but her ears did not pick up on the noise of breathing.

Was Dante dead?

No! Hezen shook her head; there was no way a strong person like Dante could die_ that_ easily! She spun on her heel and darted over to the pool as fast as she could with one arm, her eyes locked on the pool water as it waved over and over again and took Dante beneath its surface. Blood dripped down from her cut palm and created a path but she paid it no mind.

Meanwhile Pena jumped forward and landed in front of Lore before the strange Dream Member could do something more to damage the situation at hand. Bringing up his thin sword, Pena inhaled through his nose.

"Don't move," Pena hissed out.

Lore smirked and rolled his eyes. "What are you going to do? You failed as a guardian angel, what makes you think that you can destroy a god?"

xXx

What happened?

Wait…the fight with Lore, transforming into a demon…what else? Oh yes, Lore had stabbed him and the world had gone white. How long had it been since then? Hours? Minutes?

Dante parted his lips to breath, but instead of air, water gathered inside of his mouth and threatened to fill his lungs. He struggled in the water and pushed his arms upwards as his legs kicks underneath him. Water rushed by him and when he felt the humid air touched his face he inhaled with everything he had.

"Aw what the hell?" he panted as he bobbed around in the water, his legs still jerking to keep him afloat.

"Dante!" a female voice cried out.

He turned around in the water and saw Hezen kneeling down near the edge of the pool with her good arm stretched out towards him. He swam over to her but stopped; What about the Point?

"Dante what are you doing?"

Hezen widened her fingers as she scooted forward bust instead of grabbing it, Dante lowered his head and looked down at the crystal clear water. Pale blue eyes danced around in a hurry, looking for the one thing that might be able to change the battle around in _his_ benefit. And there, lying at the deepest end of the pool lay a glowing green crystal just waiting for someone to do something.

"Ah ha!" Taking a deep breath in, he dove under the surface of the water. With what little strength he had left he swam towards the crystal until he arrived at its side. He wrapped his fingers around the crystal and smashed it. Blood swirled in the water around him as the shards broke the thick skin there, but it was nothing compared to the pain he had felt moments ago.

_Oh yeah, jackpot!_

Victory in mind Dante kicked the bottom of the pool and propelled himself upwards. He took in a gasp of air when he broke the surface and swam over to Hezen's direction. His blood darkened the water around him as she reached her blooded hand to his.

"You idiot…" she whimpered as tears cascaded down her face. Why was she crying? He wasn't dead or anything. "You'd better be okay!"

"Fine." Dante rolled his eyes good-heartily.

"You don't have much time!" Pena's strained voice echoed throughout the lobby. "Hurry up and mix your blood!"

Hezen glanced back at Dante and held her bleeding hand out. "Come on, Dante. I know you can do this."

Smirking, the devil hunter slapped his hand into hers and cupped it. "Right!"

Skin broken by cuts and sacrifices bled and their blood touched with one another's. Her human blood seeped into the slash of a demon's hand and his human innocence came back to him as if their bonding had never happened. Light broke from their combined hands and the light filled Dante's dark being. Every wound on him healed within the light, and he sprung from the water with his trademark cocky grin.

"Pena!" Dante crossed Ebony and Ivory over one another and bent back a bit to help with the recoil. "Get down!"

Without hesitation the blond human jumped away from the bloodied Lore, giving Dante a clear shot. Bullets shot out from the barrel of each gun as Dante's index finger pulled the trigger over and over again. Heat shot up his arms from the guns, a heat that brought him comfort in the darkest of places. Lore screamed out as the bullets entered and exited his body, gore and chunks skin flying backwards with a bullet right behind it. Every tiny piece of Lore smacked against the nearby walls, and without his Point he could not heal the wounds simple bullets created.

"Noo!!" Lore screamed out at the top of his filling lungs.

Dante shoved Ebony and Ivory back into their holsters and charged forward as he brought Rebellion forward. Yelling as he pointed the sword his father had left him forward, he used his human and demon strength and thrust his blade deep into Lore's body. Another pain filled cry left Lore as he threw his head back, life fluid and torn pieces of organs spraying from his mouth.

"H-h-how is this p-p-possible?" Lore whined as the thick spew dribbled down his chin and coved his shirt.

"Shouldn't have challenged the Son of Sparda." Dante removed his blade and allowed it to drop at his side, crimson dripping off of his sword. "Hey, don't you owe me a question or somethin' like that?"

Blood gushed from Lore's lips as he collapsed to the floor. His back slammed against the floor with a wet slap as his back met the shattered organs that once belonged in his body. "Whatever you wish…I never go back on my word."

The question left his mouth before he could even think it over. "Why is Evern hangin' around the Hilton hotel?"

Hezen perked at that name and stepped forward, her eyes wide and mouth slightly open. "Evern?!"

"He is the," Lore coughed up a collection of gore, "fifth Dream Member. You must fight him in order to move up the ladder and meet the leader. He will beat you, Dante! I promise you…that…"

In a bright flash of light, Lore's body dissolved into sand that stretched along his height right along the devil hunter's boots. Dante chuckled and sheathed his sword, then turned and walked over to Hezen with a proud smirk on his face. He had done it, Lore was gone and he was one step closer to finding out what this whole Dream Member thing was about. Next on his mental list, he had to visit the Hilton hotel and get Evern to talk.

_Two down, five more to go!_

"Well, well, well, look at the job I did here!" Dante said as he approached Hezen, whose eyes remained locked on the pile of sand. "I say we head on home!"

But Hezen had other ideas. "W-what did he say…about Evern?" she whispered as her bleeding hand dropped to her side. "You said that he was at the…Hilton," she trailed off before finding her voice again, "the Hilton hotel, what are you talking about?"

"Oh…" Words froze in his mouth, his vocal cords refusing to work. How could he forget something so important? Hezen didn't _know_ about the meetings with Evern, and as he stood there the memory of Pena asking him not to tell filled his mind. Smart move.

"Dante?" She marched over to him and stood in front of him as tears welled in the corners of her eyes. "W-what did you s-s-say?"

Why was she stuttering? What emotion was she holding back? Dante glanced down at the shorter woman, eyes shifting around in their sockets as his mind searched for some sort of lie that would make sense in this situation. But nothing came to him, as fast his mind worked to keep up with his smart mouth he _blanked_ out.

"Dante!" she screamed. "Answer me!!"

Like a deer caught in the headlights, Dante threw his hands up and chuckled, his default gesture. "Look I fought this demon in the Hilton hotel and he turned in Evern after a while, alright! No big deal!"

She gripped her good hand into a fist. "W-was that the time you came back all beat up?"

"Uh," he glanced upwards and mentally counted how many times he had come back to the apartment cut up, "just about, yeah it was."

The next thing Dante felt was a bloody fist pressed into the left side of his face. The force from the punch moved his face in the said direction, but otherwise he remained still. His cheek throbbed, but as his human blood coursed through him the muscles there healed and the pain disappeared.

"Hezen, don't!" Pena called.

When the fist was removed from his face, Dante looked downward and saw Pena holding his master back who, by now, had a stream of tears running down her face. His right arm linked underneath her good one as his left wrapped right above her stomach and underneath her breasts. She struggled against his strong hold, a harsh glare in her eyes.

"You bastard!" she cried. "Why didn't you tell me!? What the hell is wrong with you, Dante? Do you understand what you've done?"

"Apparently not," he answered rubbing the left side of his face. "Jeez you've got a great punch for a doctor."

"Screw that you Goddamned child!" Hezen wiggled in Pena's hold, her legs kicking underneath her. "Why didn't you tell me he was still alive!? Are you mental? You knew…you knew how I felt about it and yet you didn't tell me!" She closed her eyes and screamed in frustration.

"_Sorry_, I thought I was doing you a favor." Dante rolled his eyes and spun on his heel. She definitely needed some cool down time. "I'm going to take care of Evern tomorrow morning, so why don't you head home and relax? You don't even have to come."

Her eyes widened as she gasped. "That's it!" She ripped herself from Pena's hold and stomped her foot. "I want nothing more to do with you, you've caused nothing but problems since you've come into my life and I won't put up with it anymore!! I'm _done_ with _you_!"

"_I'm sorry. I shouldn't have treated you like a child earlier. You can take care of yourself well, and I guess…"_

_She's just mad, she'll calm done in awhile. Just like last time, I ain't gonna let it get to me. Just walk away and come back later, things will be fine. _

Dante shook his head and walked away from the two. "I'll catch you two later!" he said as he strolled down and exited the building. He threw up his hand before he stepped through the door, but to who he didn't know.

She would get over it, she had to.

* * *

R&R please!


End file.
